


tell me we'll never get used to it

by doritoFace1q



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hannibal (TV) Fusion, Alternate Universe - Serial Killers, Bad Therapy, Blood and Gore, Cannibalism, Childhood Friends, Everyone Has Issues, F/M, Implied Sexual Content, Mentioned Rose Tyler, Murder, Murder Mystery, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Character Death, Rough Kissing, Serial Killers, Slow Burn, Violence, hannibal au i guess, it is with a heavy heart that i must inform you that the cannibalism in this fic is minimal 😔, misuse of the lion king, not really a mystery though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-17
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-15 18:15:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 44,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28817655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doritoFace1q/pseuds/doritoFace1q
Summary: Theta wouldn't call herself an angry person. Restless, maybe. Bitter, perhaps. Contrary, even. But angry was just unfair. After all, there's only so much one can handle when hunting down a serial killer, fending off a face from the past, and ignoring a dead fiancée all at once.Angry? Pshah.She's fine, so long as no one minds the bodies in the boot.
Relationships: Thirteenth Doctor/The Master (Dhawan)
Comments: 24
Kudos: 21
Collections: Fiftieth Masterversary Big Bang





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday to one (plural) feral bastard. Bit late, but it's the thought that counts.
> 
> Updates on Mondays and Wednesdays.
> 
> Title from Richard Siken's Crush

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She squinted at the card again, forcing herself to focus on the curly word through the darkness and vision that was beginning to blur. _Trauma_ , _grief_ , and _emotional counselling_ were words she managed to make out, and she snickered mirthlessly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know what the NCA does and it shows.
> 
> warnings at the bottom

He was restless.

That was never good, least of all for the people around him.

Irritated, that’s what he was. Irritated, annoyed, antsy, aggravated, vexed, irked, and _restless_. Tired, too, but that was a problem for later.

He drummed his fingers against his thigh, watching the fire flicker merrily in the hearth. How long had it been? A month, maybe more? He took a small sip of wine, wrinkling his nose as he washed it around in his mouth and watched the firelight bounce off the glass. Strong and earthy, with a bitter aftertaste erring just on the side of too sweet that lingered on the back of his tongue.

 _Be nice to have something to go with that, wouldn’t it_?

No more than every six months, he’d promised himself. Nothing good ever came from overindulgence of any kind, he knew.

Still. . . he was so _bored_.

He could write rhapsodies about infallibility, and the sheer stupidity of believing in it. Nothing dependable, nothing guaranteed. There was always the illusion, though, the _what if_ nudging the back of your mind, whispering sweet suggestions and lingering promises. Promises that stuck, and prodded at you, and dangled tantalizing possibilities in front of you, and egged you on to chase them. The carrot that led the pig into the pit. _Like an idiot_.

Promises never did anyone ever good. Like a double-ended pistol, with an inverted trigger tied to a ticking clock. Bound to backfire eventually, and then who knew which end would go off?

He took another sip of wine, then tossed the rest of it into the fire. The flames roared and he stood, straightening his suit.

Promises were overrated, anyway.

***

There was a body in Weymouth. Or, rather, there had been. That shouldn’t have been her problem. She shouldn’t have been in Jack’s office without him, either, but better to ask forgiveness, right?

The lock had been a bit too easy. Theta would have been worried about security if it hadn’t been so convenient for her.

She swung the chair around then kicked her feet up onto the desk. Keyboard in lap, she scrolled first through Jack’s email, then his Twitter. She wrinkled her nose and closed the tab.

She didn’t look up when she heard the office door swing open, nor when Jack swore. “Hi,” she said.

A sigh, and shuffling across the carpet. “How did you get in?”

Theta didn’t look up. “You emailed me,” she said, flicking through Jack’s many, many windows. “Your organization system’s terrible, you know?”

“That doesn’t answer my question.” Jack leaned his cane against the wall. “You won’t find it on there,” he added, shrugging off his coat and tossing it over the couch. “Haven’t uploaded it yet.”

“I thought everything was digital these days.”

“Eh.” Jack tapped the back of the seat. She gave herself one final spin and hopped off. “I’m an old-fashioned guy.” Jack sat down with a small wince and a grunt. “You still haven’t told me how you got in.”

Theta flopped into an armchair, swinging her legs over the armrest. “Have you already cleaned up the scene?” she asked, kicking her feet idly.

“This morning.”

Theta wrinkled her nose. “Huh.” She slid a bit lower in the seat and stared up at the ceiling. “Photos, at least?”

“Downstairs.” Silence. “With Martha.”

 _Ah_. “Ah,” she said.

“Have you seen her?” he asked. “Since—”

“No,” she said shortly.

An awkward silence fell. Theta dragged her thumb against the side of her finger, listening to the ticking of the clock on the wall (a fraction of a second off from the watch on her wrist—just enough of a difference to be noticeable and set her teeth on edge).

“It’s been a year,” said Jack.

She exhaled, nostrils flaring. “I know.”

“I haven’t seen you since—”

“I _know_.”

More silence. Her fists were clenched, Theta noticed, and she uncurled them. Her skin throbbed where her nails had bit into her palms, leaving angry red indents.

“This can’t be permanent,” said Jack.

“Why not?” Theta demanded, sitting up properly. “I _want_ to come back, Jack—I’ve got time, you need me, and I’m going mad with nothing to do—”

“That’s not the problem, and you know it.”

“What is the problem, then?” she asked. “What do you want?”

“Psych eval.”

She bristled. “I’m not mad, Jack,” she spat.

“I know,” and _damn him_ for sounding so reasonable. She was supposed to be the reasonable one. Or rational, at least.

She kicked her heel against the ground, grinding her boot against the carpet. “You called me,” she said, trying not to sound too bitter.

“Yeah, don’t make me regret it.” She snorted. “Thete, we think it’s him.”

 _Him_ . What was that supposed to mean, _him_ ? There were any number of _him_ s he could mean. Jack gave her a significant look and she raised her eyebrows.

Ah. Him.

Fuck.

“Don’t kick me off again,” she said.

“Don’t give me a reason to.”

***

Theta had gone caving, once. She remembered a lot from that day—the gaping mouth of the cave and the yawning darkness, like the gullet of a hungry beast; the feel of wet stone beneath her fingers and rough helmet straps digging into the skin beneath her chin; shards of pottery and bits of broken glass gathering dust and lichen on ledges and in nooks; the way the sunlight had fallen through a gap between the stones and bounced off the water, throwing fractures of light like flecks of glitter or bits of burning ember onto the cavern ceiling far, far above.

And the cold. She remembered the cold, too.

The change in temperature had been a slow thing, but not quite enough to be unnoticeable. Gooseflesh pricking on her arms and the back of her neck, and shivering at sudden chills that washed over her in waves. Icy torchlight and frigid air, and rock that might as well have been ice beneath her feet.

She’d loved it.

The morgue was nothing like that. There was nothing gradual about the stark steel cabinets lining the walls, the glass door swinging silently shut behind them. There was definitely nothing gradual about the sensation that she’d just marched through a glacial waterfall with all the confidence of an army invading Russia in the winter.

The smell, too. Disinfectant and cleaning solution mingling with sickeningly artificial fruity air freshener, and the underlying, never-ceasing smell of death. Death, and old popcorn.

And, there, bent over a desk, was its keeper.

“Jack, is that you?” asked Martha, not looking up from her screen. “I’ve just sent the files you asked for. But why do you need—” She looked up. “Oh.”

Theta grinned. She had a feeling it didn’t reach her eyes. “Hi.”

“I—” Martha blinked, and stood. “Hi,” she finally said, a smile following a heartbeat after. It looked genuine. “It’s good to see you.”

“Yeah.” Theta tucked her hands into her pockets. Jack nudged her. “I mean—uh,” she cleared her throat and looked down, scuffing the floor with the tip of a boot. “You too,” she said. “You look good.”

“You too,” said Martha. “It’s—” her arm twitched, like she wanted to gesture at something, but just flopped back to her side. “I like the hair.”

A hand came up almost automatically, brushing at the strands of blonde that were starting to grow past her shoulders. “Yeah,” said Theta, like they were on a wheel. “Yours, too.”

It did. She’d grown it out, Theta noticed, and stopped tying it back. She looked different. Lighter. Martha smiled, and it looked like it came easier.

“I look good too, in case anyone’s wondering,” said Jack.

Martha burst out laughing and Jack snickered. Theta rolled her eyes, but she was smiling too. “Stop it,” she said automatically.

Jack snorted, and Martha giggled. Theta grinned.

And then—

Her eyes drifted past Martha, landing on the shape beneath the white sheet. Martha followed her gaze, and the smile slid off her face like water off the back of a duck. “Right,” she said.

“Yeah,” said Theta.

Like they were on a wheel.

***

Kerry Armitage, 31. Systems analyst. Dead.

_A hallway._

_His exhibit._

_She pushed the door open_.

The scratches were the first thing Theta noticed. The skin on her face, the back of her arms, the soles of her feet.

_Her feet._

Her fingers ghosted over the pale, scrubbed clean pale soles, scrubbed impersonally clean.

“She crashed into a backyard,” Jack told her. “Mom and the kid heard screaming, Dad found her in the tulips.”

_Get her fingers—no, no, teeth first. Put it down, don’t hurt yourself; you’ve got time._

_No, you don’t._

_You’re an anomaly. Why? This isn’t a mistake—what is it? How little were you worth? How big a risk?_

_I don’t like feet. Never have. Or legs. Weird things, legs. But I guess you do. Agree to disagree?_

_What do you do with a foot? And where do you keep it?_

_Careful—it’s heavy._

“Her head’s in a pretty nasty state,” said Martha. “She hit the flowerbed. But the cause of death was blood loss. See, here—” she pulled back the sheet, revealing the pale trunks of the dead woman’s legs. They should be bruised, thought Theta, or bleeding, at the least. But, no. Grey and unblemished, save for the scratches and scrapes, cleaned and reduced to thin red lines.

It was almost a shame.

_Are you a pest, an insect, or an ape? Are you nothing or are you everything? It’s always hard to tell._

_You thought you were a god because you made a stick burn, so he cut you down to size. You were slow, and you were stupid, and anything would be better than listening to you talk. You kicked me. Or maybe you didn’t do anything at all, and he cut you anyways because he could. I don’t know._

_I know._

_Were you a nice person, I wonder? Or were you cruel? Did you tick him off, or was it convenient? And what about your convenience made it so convenient for him? Obviously._

_That's one thing we have in common, I suppose. You don’t take no for an answer. Neither do I. Nor him._

“They severed the femoral artery,” said Martha, pointing at the gash behind her knee. Muddy red and pink, framed by spotted white. Theta was pretty sure she’d seen a painting like that before. “It’s a miracle she managed to get that far. And we found traces of Rohypnol,” she added. “She’d have been unconscious, at least for a bit.”

 _You think cutting a tendon when it’s on your plate is hard? Try doing it when it’s still trying to get away_.

“Not enough.” Theta crouched, leaning in to peer at the wound. “Clearly. And how far was that, exactly?”

“She left tracks in the dirt,” said Jack. “There was a forest, not far from where she was found. Two hundred feet, maybe?”

“Signs of scuffle?” _Scuffle_ . She’d always liked that word, scuffle. _Scuffle_. Theta’s own breath was warm against her face, and she could almost imagine it misting against the cold, dead skin. Like a mirror, or a vase.

“Yeah, and traces of blood that didn’t match hers.”

The smell was overpowering. Theta wrinkled her nose. The skin around the cut (Gash? Slice? Chasm?) was not neat. Not the way a cut would have been, anyway. She could see the rubbery, grey-tinged pink of the split artery. It kind of looked like a plastic straw.

Ragged edges.

 _Neat. Clean. Planned and perfect. Everything is under my control_.

Sawing?

The tap of a cane against tile rang out through the room like a drumbeat. Or gunshots. “Back of the knee, though,” said Jack, limping forwards. “Not exactly what you’d call an orthodox murder.”

“Jack,” said Martha, giving him a significant look, “thinks it’s the Master.”

“And Martha,” said Jack, “wants me sectioned.”

“You shouldn’t call him the Master.” Theta stood, backing away from the slab. “Too grandiose. Elevates him. You never want that.”

Jack frowned. “You didn’t have a problem with it before.”

“No,” Theta agreed. “Still don’t.”

***

“Ground rules, Theta.”

Theta gasped. “Jack Harkness follows rules? I never thought I’d see the day.”

“No,” Jack corrected, “Jack Harkness makes rules. Everyone else follows them.”

“How did your team ever put up with you?” Theta wondered.

“You tell me.” Jack grinned.

Theta scrunched up her face at him. He stuck his tongue out. “Fine,” she said.

“Ground rules,” Jack repeated. “Basic stuff. Remember, you’re not an active agent anymore—”

“Never was,” Theta interjected.

Jack shot her a withering look. She waved a hand, gesturing at him to go on. “No more breaking into offices,” he said. “Or don’t let me catch you, at least. Limited access to files, ask Martha for the stuff you can’t steal. _And_ —” She glanced up sharply. He sighed. “You’re going to need a service weapon.”

“Nope,” she said.

“Theta—” Jack began, looking pained.

“No,” Theta said firmly.

“Thete—”

“ _No_ ,” Theta repeated. “They do have that word in America, right?”

“You’ve used them before. What’s the problem, now?”

“The problem,” she said, glaring at him, “is _guns_. Don’t do ‘em. Shan’t.”

Silence, again. She’d have found it annoying if she weren’t so used to it. And then, quietly, “Is this about—”

Theta swung Jack’s chair around, her feet knocking loudly into the side of his desk. She grimaced, drawing them closer to perch on the edge of the seat. “Tell me about him, then,” she said, rubbing her throbbing heels through her boots. “This _doctor_ .” She refused to think of her scowl as _petulant_. If anything, it wasn’t petulant enough.

Jack leaned back with a sigh, but didn’t press. Theta wasn’t so foolish as to think that meant he’d dropped it. “I’ve been seeing him for a while,” he told her. “Not like that,” he said when she raised her eyebrows. “Though I wouldn’t mind,” he added with a grin that bordered on a leer. Theta rolled her eyes. “You mock me now, Dr. Lungbarrow,” said Jack haughtily, “but only ‘cause you’ve never seen that ass—”

“Careful, Captain,” said Theta. “That’s malpractice.”

Jack snickered. Then he raised his head, a small frown on his face. “Wait, really?”

“No,” said Theta. He pouted at her. “Tell me about him,” she said. “ _Properly_.”

“Killjoy,” he sighed. “He’s good, Theta. Really. Friend of mine, Gwen, recommended him to me after—” He cleared his throat. “Recommended him last year.”

“Not good for the good Captain to be seen seeing a shrink?” Theta asked drily.

“Nope,” said Jack, popping the P. “It’s technically off the record if it’s in my own time.”

“Really.”

“Yeah.”

“Huh.” Theta glanced at her watch. “He’s late.”

“Your watch is slow,” said Jack.

“No, it’s not.”

“Yeah, it is.”

Theta shoved her hands into her pockets and slid down the seat until she was practically hanging off it. “What’s his name?” she asked.

“K—”

Theta’s head jerked up at four swift raps at the door. “You want to get that?” asked Jack.

“Nope,” Theta spun the chair around, the side of Jack’s desk nearly taking off her legs. Maybe she should move. “Go on, Captain, introduce us!” She swung around again.

She kept spinning, feet bumping across the carpet, as Jack pulled himself to his feet and limped across the room. She heard the squeak of his door as he pulled it open, and the low murmur of pleasantries. She kicked her heels into the ground and the chair rolled backwards, spiralling in the other direction.

“Doc.” Her teeth clacked together, _loudly_ , as a hand grabbed the arm of the chair, bringing it to a halt. “Join us?”

“If you insist.” She slid out of the chair and stood up straight, running a hand through her hair. There was a man behind Jack, she saw for the first time, purple overcoat slung over an arm and sporting an impressive checkered waistcoat. His back was turned to her, and he was looking out the window.

He turned around.

Her eyes widened.

Something crossed his face, but she couldn’t have put a name to it if she tried, and she didn’t.

“Dr. Lungbarrow,” Jack introduced her. “Theta, meet Dr. Koschei Oakdown.”

 _What_ , she thought, _the fuck_.

***

_“What are you running away from?”_

_“What makes you think I’m running away from anything?”_

_“Well, you’re running, and now you’re hiding. Most people don’t do that for fun.”_

_“You’re doing it. Sort of.”_

_“Yeah, but I’m not most people.”_

***

Theta had never understood what people meant when they said “it’s five o’clock somewhere.” Who had decided that five o’clock was the perfect time to drink? Which it wasn’t.

Neither was 11 p.m., she supposed.

Meh. She took another sip.

_“Theories, Doctor?”_

_“Hm.” She’d tucked her hands in her pockets and rocked back on her heels. “Yup. A few.”_

_“Mind sharing them?”_

_“The thing is,” she’d said, steamrolling right over him. “Like you said, back of the knee, not exactly where you’d aim for if you were going for a quick kill, is it? Even if she was knocked out at the time.”_

_“So?” Jack had asked. More for the sake of asking, not necessarily because he’d needed to. Nice of him, letting her get into the flow._

The cheap whiskey burnt as it went down, but she didn’t particularly care. Go on, she thought, making to kick her feet up onto the coffee table and missing by inches. _Burn. Burn, like everything else in my life_. She took another gulp, and coughed.

_“So,” she’d said, swinging around, the tail of her coat flapping behind her (She liked a long coat. Mickey liked to say it was because she was a dramatic bastard and, well, he couldn’t be wrong all the time). “That’s a cut, a proper cut, not a slash. He wasn’t trying to kill her—well, he was, but he wasn’t trying to do it like that.”_

_Jack had made a noise of strangled triumph, and Martha had inhaled sharply. “Trophy,” she’d breathed._

_“The Master,” Jack had said at the same time, lips set in a grim line._

She glanced down at the card still clutched in her hand, chest throbbing, blinking away tears. A name and an address written in a stupidly elegant swirl, and a phone number. It was edged in the same gold that lined his obnoxious purple coat.

 _Call me_ , he’d said, like he was humouring a small child, or a particularly stupid dog. _Does next Wednesday work for you?_ A cordial, friendly smile she’d wanted to slap off his face. _Lovely weather, isn’t it?_ Succinct and professional. _I’ve got a vacancy at half six._ _A pleasure to meet you, Dr. Lungbarrow. Might I ask, what—_

 _Psychology_ , she’d said, pointedly not taking the outstretched hand. It had stayed there for a few moments more before he let it drop, falling to dangle at his side.

_Practicing?_

_No._

Polite. Almost sarcastically so, she’d daresay.

Like strangers. Or a doctor and a patient.

Right. There was that, now, too.

 _“He takes them while they’re alive?”_ Squeamish _was far, far from the list of words Theta would use to describe Martha Jones, but she’d still looked sick when she turned to glance at the unassuming shape draped in white cloth. “Why? It can’t be sadism, can it, if they’re out while he does it?”_

_Theta had shrugged, twisting idly on her heel. “More satisfying?” she’d suggested. “Preference for live blood? Keep it fresh?”_

_“Doc,” Jack had said, looking nauseous._

_Theta turned to look at the body._ The body _. How do you describe a life? A story, or a collection of them? An entire world, here and there and gone in the space of a second, or just a blip? Incomprehensible. That’s a nice cop-out._ Incomprehensible _. Incomprehensible and so easily laid plain. A body, a corpse, a bundle of cells on a slab. Poof. “Except something went wrong,” she’d said. “Something that had never happened before. Something that shouldn’t have happened.”_

_“She ran,” said Martha._

_“Yes, but why?” Theta had spun on her heel, hair whipping round and smacking her in the face. “Well, no obvious answer._ How _?” She’d snapped her fingers as she paced up and down the length of the room. “Mistake? Not likely. He wouldn’t have overlooked anything.”_

Damn him. Damn him and damn Jack and damn the stupid _ground rules_. Damn him for coming out of nowhere, and fuck him for looking right past her like he’d barely registered her existence. Like she wasn’t worth his time.

_“Immunity,” Martha had said suddenly._

_“What?”_

_“Immunity,” she’d repeated. “Or some sort of tolerance. Rohypnol’s a recreational drug, if she’d been taking it before—”_

_“_ Oh.” _Theta had thrown her hands into the air. “Martha Jones, you are brilliant.”_

_“He wouldn’t have had a clue,” said Martha, eyes wide._

She made to take a swig from the bottle, only to find it empty. She frowned and turned it upside down, shaking it a few times. A drop fell from the lip and landed on her leg. She watched the amber liquid sink into the fabric of her trousers, then dropped the bottle with a scowl. It landed with a muffled _clunk_ and rolled away.

And fuck her if she ever found herself mentioning alcohol during the _session_.

 _“Oh.” Theta had grabbed her hair and spun around. “Oh, oh,_ oh _.” She’d dropped her hands and whirled around to face them. “Fours,” she’d whispered. “It was a mistake.”_

_“Wh—” Jack’s face fell. “Oh.”_

_“How long’s it been since the last one?” Theta had asked, voice hushed and barely audible._

_Jack and Martha had exchanged a look. “Just under a year,” Martha had said, all traces of excitement gone._

_“He’s late,” Jack had said grimly._

She squinted at the card again, forcing herself to focus on the curly word through the darkness and vision that was beginning to blur. _Trauma_ , _grief_ , and _emotional counselling_ were words she managed to make out, and she snickered mirthlessly.

_Theta had turned her gaze back to the body on the table and voiced the thought that was echoing in all of their minds._

_“There’s going to be another body.”_

She balled the card up in her fist and hurled it across the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: dead body, discussions of murder, alcohol


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’d thought about him. Of course she had.
> 
> Not obsessively, mind, she reminded herself, wiping her arm across her forehead. Her sleeve came away clinging with sweat and hair and. . . well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings at the bottom
> 
> EDIT: fixed the italics. i think that's a google docs thing?

The waiting room looked like something out of a catalogue, or a film for people with way too much time on their hands. She’d been staring at the walls for so long that she felt, if she closed her eyes, the inside of her eyelids would be split pea green, too.

She glanced at her watch. 5:28.

She groaned and slumped lower in her seat, heels bumping and scuffing across the stiff red carpet. She traced the patterns in the armrest and stared up at the ceiling, letting her eyes roam from lighting fixture to lighting fixture.

She really did hate waiting.

She slid out of the seat and landed in a heap on the ground. The carpet was far from comfortable, but at least it was a change. She flopped onto her side.

It had been an eternity. It must have.

She held her arm up in front of her face, squinting at her watch.

5:29. Close enough.

She scrambled to her feet and knocked on the door. She didn’t wait for an answer before pushing it open and sauntering in.

If the waiting room had been ostentatious, then the office would have been enough to put a king to shame, if that king had been interested in furniture resembling the unholy union of Baroquian loveseats and high-backed leather stools, and paintings made by elephants. The desk was a behemoth of a thing, a little off from the middle of the room and gleaming under the lights like it was carved out of black ice, or something you’d see on a tour of the palace of Versailles.

The man himself was sitting behind it, bent over a sheet of paper with a pen in hand. She watched as he signed off on whatever it was with a flourish and stood, rounding the desk. “Doctor,” he greeted, not looking up.

“Doctor,” she nodded.

He nodded back as he sank into one of the twin couches. Theta didn’t think he’d have managed to look more relaxed if he’d thrown himself into the seat and sank into the cushions. He crossed one leg over the other, tapping the paper against his knee, and gestured at the seat across from him.

Oh, yeah. That.

Theta took her time moving across the room, pausing whenever she could (which was constantly) to peer at paintings, and touch the panelling, and drum her fingers across tabletops. “Nice place,” she said, dragging her finger along a swirl in the wallpaper. “Very chic. Is that the word? Classic? Elaborate? _Haute couture?_ ” She pushed herself away from the wall, then dragged a hand over the back of the empty couch. Black too, obviously, all hard edges and stiff buttons and shiny metal bits that made her shiver just looking at them. “Nah, that’s not right, is it?” She tapped her chin, frowning. “Fancy?” She slapped out a quick beat on the couch back. No cushions. Shame. She liked cushions, especially the ones with tassels. Not the kind that always fell out, mind—the floppy kinds, like ribbons cut into thick strands, that you could braid, and would flap around when you tossed the cushions back and forth. “Classy!” She snapped her fingers, beaming triumphantly. “Classy! It’s classy!” Or the ropey kind. The ropey kind was good, too.

He was staring at her a bit strangely, she realized. “What?” she asked.

“You—” He gestured at his cheek, then at hers.

Her hand flew to her cheek, and she rubbed the marks from the carpet. “Oh, yeah.” She dropped her hand. “You should really get some new carpet, you know? It’s a miracle you get anything done with that monstrosity out there.”

“Right.” He gestured at the seat again. “Doctor?”

“I mean, really, we don’t give carpets nearly enough credit,” Theta continued. “Amazing stuff, carpet. Friend of mine was having a bad day once, and he bought a new rug. Cheered him up right away. Let it spark joy! Ooh, you should get one of those fluffy kinds, with the really long hair things?” She frowned. “Or is that too informal?” She shrugged. “Dunno. Never cared for that part, myself.”

“Doctor,” he repeated. There was an edge to his tone, and Theta’s smile dropped. “Here,” he said brusquely, as she moved around the couch, and held out the paper.

She took it as she sat. The couch really was stiff. It was the kind of stiff found in new boots at the store, or wet jackets left in the sun for weeks on end, the kind of stiff that made you wonder if leather was really made from cows. It was the kind of stiff found in couches made for warehouses and exhibitions and everything else but sitting. It was also the kind of stiff that made it really, really difficult to concentrate on anything.

Theta squirmed in her seat as she scanned the paper, shifting back and forth on the couch. No matter where she moved, there always seemed to be a button hell-bent on digging into her back or legs. “I might be wrong,” she said, “so correct me if I am, but aren’t the reports supposed to be handed out after the test?”

He shrugged. “No point,” he said. “We both know you wouldn’t have passed.”

“Right.” She flipped the paper back and forth between her fingers. “Because you know me so well.” His signature was scrawled across the dotted line, and it flapped and wiggled as she moved the paper. It looked a bit like a massive, sprawling snake, or a trickle of water carving out a track down a column of sand, or maybe one of those tilting pen machines at art museums, except that, instead of a pretty swirl, it was just drawing a really, really angry squiggle.

“If you like.”

“Sure.” She shifted again, and, somehow, found herself under the assault of not one, not two, but _three_ buttons. What a bitchy couch. “Okay. So. . .” She glanced down at the paper again. “I’m sane,” she said.

“You’re sane,” Koschei agreed drily. “Congratulations.”

“Does this mean I can leave?” she asked.

He shrugged. “You know as well as I do,” he said. “But I’d like it if you didn’t.”

“Huh.” She leaned back on the couch, trying to find a more comfortable position. She didn’t. “Why’s that?”

“‘Cause you’re not.”

“What?”

“Sane.”

“Huh.” She bounced up and down a bit—tried to, at least—then crossed one leg over the other. Then the other leg over the other. Then brought her legs up onto the couch and crossed them. Then let her feet hit the ground again.

“And—” he hesitated. She raised an eyebrow. “I’d like to talk.”

“Talk,” she repeated. “Okay. Talk. Talk.” She scratched behind her ear. “Talk about what?”

“What did you talk to your patients about?” he asked.

“Didn’t,” she said. “When I said I wasn’t practicing, I didn’t mean just now.”

He raised his eyebrows. “What, never?”

“Nope.” She popped the P. “Never been good at the. . .” she waved her hand around, “ _this_ part, me.”

“I know.”

“Do you, now?” She cocked her head. “Does Jack?”

He tilted his head back at her. She wrinkled her nose. “What does Director Harkness think of me?”

“Doctor-patient confidentiality, Doctor.” Cheek.

“Shame,” she said, picking at the couch beneath her. Maybe it was childish of her to exact her vengeance against an inanimate piece of furniture, but, even so, the ripping noise the leather made as her nail dragged against it made her heart soar with nothing less than vindication. “Guess I’ve got nothing to say to you, then.”

“Whatever you want,” he said. “This is your session.”

“Ah.” She gave him a nod and a meaningful look. “I see. Opting out of duty, Dr. Oakdown?” She pinched the paper between two fingers and waved it around like a little flag.

He shrugged. 

“Nah, don’t think I will.” She balled the sheet up and tucked it into her left pocket. His cheek twitched as she stretched out, kicking her legs out in front of her, still picking at the couch. She was almost hanging off the edge of the couch, but at least there weren’t any buttons digging into her anymore. Oh, wait—never mind.

She drew circles and triangles and squares that looked like circles and ellipses in the leather, then stuck her finger into it and pressed down, stretching the leather as far as it could go, then went back to picking at it.

She glanced up. Koschei was still watching her. She looked back down at the couch, and resumed her efforts in prying at the edges of one of the godforsaken buttons.

Silence, still. Finally, she sighed and said, “It’s good to see you, Koschei.”

“Wish I could say the same.”

She pursed her lips and looked down, toying with a loose thread hanging from her shirt. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Just that. _Yeah_. “You changed your hair.”

She shrugged. “You haven’t.”

“No,” he agreed.

She twisted the string around her finger. “Why doesn’t Jack know?”

“What, that we went to school together?” He raised an eyebrow. “Did you tell him?”

“No,” she said.

“Well, there you go.”

She crossed her arms, just for something to do. He pressed his fingertips together, hands steepling. She’d seen psychiatrists strike that pose before, in cheap television dramas.

It was true that silence can be more profound than words. It was also true that it could be really awkward and increase considerations of jumping out a nearby window just to get the conversation going.

Koschei jiggled his foot and sighed. “Tell me about your job.”

“You know what my job is.”

“Don’t be difficult.”

“You first.”

“Why did you stop?”

She pinched the leather between two fingers and twisted. “It wasn’t exactly my suggestion.”

“Very illuminating, thank you.”

“You never mentioned wanting to be a doctor,” she said. “Actually,” she amended, “you never mentioned wanting to be anything.”

“Your last assignment,” he said. “What was it?”

She tugged at one of her suspenders, then let go. It snapped back against her shoulder. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

“No, you never do.” His lip curled bitterly.

She clucked her tongue. “That’s not very professional, is it?”

“ _Theta_.”

She exhaled long and hard through her nostrils. “Call it imagination,” she said.

“Imagination,” he repeated.

“Sure.” She bared his teeth in a humorless smile and he raised an eyebrow. “Different viewpoints. Perspective. Normal, stuff, really.”

“You guess.” She couldn’t quite decide whether he sounded incredulous or amused. Both, she decided.

“And I’m good at it.”

He scowled. “Success rate?” She shrugged. “You must know.”

She shrugged again. “High,” she said. “It’s high.”

“Not 100, though.”

“No.” The thread hanging off her shirt was curled and kinked from her tugging at it. She wrapped it around her finger, pulling it tight. “No, it’s not.”

“Tell me about why you stopped.”

“You know why.”

“Don’t be difficult.”

“Then don’t be an arse.” The thread came off with a _snap_. “You want to talk?”

He looked around the room, a perfect _who, me?_ expression on his face. “Well,” he said, “that’s the idea.”

“Then _talk to me_.” The marks from where the string had dug into her fingers like a garrotte throbbed. She clenched the twisted, frayed strand of a thing in her fist. “Really talk to me, Koschei. Stop pretending.”

“Pretending _what_ ?” he demanded. “It’s not a conversation if neither of us know what we’re talking _about_.”

“You know what I’m talking about!” she all but shouted. “This. You. A _doctor_ , Koschei, really? You?”

If he pursed his lips any tighter, they’d vanish. “Well,” he said, simply, plainly, “I guess I can’t fault you for not knowing.”

***

She’d thought about him. Of course she had.

Not obsessively, mind, she reminded herself, wiping her arm across her forehead. Her sleeve came away clinging with sweat and hair and. . . well.

He’d crossed her thoughts enough times for it to be regular. A quick wonder about what he might be doing, the sight of a shirt like one he used to wear, a familiar face flashing across her mind unbidden.

She grunted as she dragged the first bag off the truckbed. It landed on the ground with a meaty _thud_ , the rocks she’d shoved in to weigh it down grinding against the rocky beach.

See? Normal.

(“I’ve got a slot at six next week,” he’d said, not looking up at her, “and another one at quarter eight. Or you could schedule regular meetings. The deposit’s covered, by the way,” he’d added. “Work insurance, or something.”

“Fine.” Both her hands had been in her pockets, arms stiff and rigid at her sides.

He’d snapped his planner shut, and looked up at a point somewhere between her eyebrows. “Maybe you’ll actually come back this time.”)

She’d thought about it, too, sometimes. Or, rather, she hadn’t thought about it, to the point where it became something she thought about. She’d almost acted on it, too, once or twice; her hands creeping towards the phone while her mind drifted off elsewhere, or folding a sheet of paper and sliding it into an envelope before she caught up and hurled the letter into the bin.

She pulled her collar up a bit higher, the rough wool of her gloves scratching the sensitive skin beneath her chin. The plastic of the trash bags at her feet flapped loudly in the frigid wind. It sounded a bit like a dozen baking pans slapping together in a windchime constructed by someone who only sort of knew what a windchime was, in theory. She could only hope that nobody was walking along the abandoned stretch of inlet at—she checked her watch—one in the morning.

She’d even found herself sitting in front of her computer once, the front page of Google glaring accusingly at her while she drummed her fingers on the table and stared at the screen.

She whispered a silent apology to the turtles, then hurled the first bag out. It vanished beneath the crest of a wave.

She wasn’t sure why she’d never gone through with it. Maybe for the same reason why she could barely remember her former classmates’ faces, or why there was a grave she hadn’t visited since last November. _Let sleeping dogs lie_ , she’d told herself.

Of course she was lying to herself. What else did she ever do?

She lifted the last bag with a grunt and swung around once, twice, three times. She let go, and it went sailing over the choppy surface of the water, landing with a splash that was muffled by the rocking and crashing of the waves.

She adjusted her hood, then picked up the bloodied saw. She spun it around once on her finger before hurling it into the sea as well.

Better safe than sorry.

***

_Her hand was cold._

_Well, cold_ er _. Her hands were always cold. His thumb brushed over a speck, dry and flaky against her skin, and he scraped at it with his thumb._

_“Stop,” she said. “That hurts.” He did._

_He was beginning to feel the beginnings of a chill fear and adrenaline must have been chasing off. A shiver ran through his body, and he was made startlingly aware of the water rippling gently around his waist._

_Well, not so gently, now._

_Koschei glanced up. Heavy grey clouds dragged themselves through the sky, covering the stars._

_“It’s going to rain,” he said. Her hand tightened around his._

_“Good.” She didn’t move._

_“Theta,” he said. She didn’t say anything. “_ Theta _,” he repeated. He hesitated, then dropped her hand. She let it fall, and it landed with a quiet_ plop _in the water._

_He felt like he was walking through Jell-O, or a sea of molasses, as he waded over the bank. Then he felt like he was in Jell-O indeed, as he tried to pull himself out of the water. Jell-O that had way too much gelatin and not enough water, and had been left in the freezer for a few weeks too many._

_He flopped onto the bank like a dead fish, barely feeling the pebbles digging into his skin and cutting at his cheeks. He didn’t care—he was exhausted. His muscles shook from the effort of turning his head to look at Theta._

_Who was still standing in the water._

_He forced himself to his feet and stumbled closer. “Theta,” he said again. She looked at him, and he held his hand out._

_What could he say? He owed her._

_Besides._

_The first drops fell when she was boosting him over the wall, and it was pouring by the time they sneaked back in through the doors. Their shoes, despite their best attempts at tiptoeing, squeaked against the floor. Water pooled around each step, cold and muddy. She walked in front, and he pretended he wasn’t watching pink water drip from her hair._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> how many saws do you think thirteen goes through weekly
> 
> warnings: mentioned blood, implied dismemberment


	3. by any other name

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Communion is subjective.

There was no conclusive _start_ to their time together. For her to have marked a beginning would have meant accepting that there would be an end, a limit, a day when their time would run out. And she didn’t.

She remembered the first time she’d seen her only because she knew it must have happened. What had she been wearing? Had it been sunny outside, or had it been overcast? Was the room hot or cold? When had their eyes met for the first time?

What had she seen in her?

 _This is how it goes_.

There’s a monster on the loose, and everyone is hiding. There’s a monster on the loose, and the story should have a hero. There’s a monster on the loose, and it should be taken down by spears and cannons the strength of dozens.

There’s a monster on the loose, and she doesn’t care about any of that.

The Midsummerman, they’d called him. He’d liked to display his victims in works of art so meticulous it almost hurt to take them down—knives and cyanide, crowns perched on bleach-white skulls, hands and wrists interlocked in a bed of flowers. Like children, asleep in the meadow.

 _Midsummer_ for his dreams. _Man_ because that was what they believed him to be.

Sometimes, she still cursed his name in her sleep.

***

She approaches her nightmares critically, clinically, cynically, and calculatingly, and everything else that starts with a C. What does this mean? What about that? Whose face is this? This hand? This body hanging from the rafters? Are those my demons crawling from the shadows and pinning me down, or are they someone else’s? Is it a river I’m standing in, or is it a sea?

Denial is the prescription she writes herself. She’s not a doctor for nothing.

***

She’d paid attention to her in the way a person paid attention to the stones on a trail, or the turn of the stars behind the clouds.

In another world, she didn’t think she’d even have noticed her. In another one, she didn’t think she’d have been able to tear her gaze away. Maybe in yet another one, where stakes were higher but life was simpler, they’d have been thrown together by fate and accident and wild, wild circumstances and gone up in each other’s flames, and it would have been easy.

She’d bumped into her on the first day, she recalled, going around the corner. She’d spilled tea on herself—not much, just a splash—and dropped a pen. Of all her memories of the day, she had no idea why that was the one that stood out the most. The way the mind works, eh?

She’d asked questions, she remembered. Most people liked to ask questions as if they already knew the answer to them— _so_ s and _what you’re saying_ s and _right_ s. She’d asked questions the way questions were meant to be asked—wide-eyed and curious and serious at the same time, taking things in and thinking about them instead of being bitter about being wrong. She thinks that’s what struck her first.

She’d listened with her eyes and her hands and her face and her body, and, when she’d looked up, she’d meet her eyes and nod. A happy nod, a solemn nod, an impish nod, but a nod nonetheless. _Yes_ , it said, _I hear you_.

And then, over a body stuffed with coals in a field of withered flowers, in the midst of lights and frenzy and protocol and shouting, she’d held a shaking woman in her arms and stroked her back and sat and listened until she gave a name.

***

_What do we do now?_

***

There had been an expression that almost looks like loss on her face when they’d lead Van Statten away, and, not quite sure what she was doing, but doing it anyways, she took her hand and led her to a hole-in-the-wall chippy with enough _actual_ holes in the walls that she refused to eat in the building itself (much to the disgruntlement of the woman behind the counter, who’s shouts of _It’s fucking_ atmosphere _!_ followed them all the way down the street and around the bend).

(Maybe _that’s_ when it started—the two of them wandering into a churchyard and sitting beneath stone angels, her laughing as she upset the box, and laughing harder as she plucked chips from the ground and ate them, dirt and all.)

Looking back, she found herself wondering why she never left. Or, rather, why she stayed. _Companionship_ was the word that often surfaced. Camaraderie and a mutual inability to think of anything else to do, and maybe some curiosity thrown into the mix, too.

And then, one day, on the highest bluff in the middle of nowhere, hot and sweaty and aching to the bone, the trees below lit up like a forest of flames in the light of the setting sun and the sky above burning and swirling with stars and clouds, she took her face in her hands and pressed her lips to hers, and everything felt _right_.

***

Is this love, she wonders at a point, or is this obsession. And who’s to say that it isn’t both.

She doesn’t know the difference.

***

It’s enough to say that not much changes, because it’s too much to think about the little things that do. Hands that linger for fractions of seconds that burn like dying suns and the smallest of smiles from across hallways and conference rooms that shouldn’t make her heart beat like there’s two of them but do. Gazes that hold her and make the hair stand up on the back of her neck and scorch her to the core. A jacket hanging on a doorknob in her flat and an old pink mug on the kitchen counter in hers. Calls that stretch far past what could reasonably be called night, except there’s a reason now, and strands of bleached blonde hair tangled up in the sheets with brown.

And the kisses. The kisses are good, too. And everything else that follows.

She mentions it offhandedly, one day, the pipes and mildew in her flat. And then, because she wants to help, or because she doesn’t have a filter, or for no reason at all, she’s asking her to move in.

There’s a moment, when she’s staring at her, where she thinks she’s put her foot in her mouth. But then she throws her arms around her, and she can feel her smiling against her lips.

Her flat sells surprisingly well, considering the nest of cockroaches in the bathroom they didn’t tell the buyer about.

***

Jack is ecstatic. When is he ever not?

If only he could know how it ends.

***

It had been unrealistic, she supposed to have expected things to be perfect then and for forever. More fanciful, still, for her to expect _her_ to be perfect then and for forever. Smiles tended to wilt behind closed doors and laughter turn to growls, and she had the illusion of all the time in the world to see every grin twist into a scowl.

Money was one of the few things she’d never had to worry about, which was just as well. She didn’t think she’d have been able to bring herself to care.

She’d disagreed. She’d disagreed back. And then they were shouting, and then she was storming out of the flat. The slam of the door had echoed down the hallway behind her, and kept ringing in her ears even five blocks away.

She’d spent the night curled up on a bus stop bench, hood pulled over her face and arms crossed tightly over her chest, and woken to an old woman with a shopping cart tugging at her boots.

She’d given her the boots. She didn’t know why. She still thought about them, sometimes.

She’d found her like that, twisting an old coupon the woman had given her idly in her hands, in the morning, a cup of tea in either hand and a box of custard creams tucked beneath her arm.

They’d bought a purple couch.

***

 _Three of us against the world_ , she used to say. And then it was two, and then. . .

And who knew what it was, now.

***

 _Communication is the key to a good relationship_ , she’d heard someone say once. A teacher, maybe? She doubted it was any of her friends. Maybe Jack, if he weren’t so bad at giving advice, and even worse at following it.

Communion is subjective. She talks, of course she talks. It’s the one thing she’s never learned not to do. She talks and she talks and she talks, but she never _says_ , and she doesn’t think she hasn’t noticed.

She knew her; she barely knew her. She told her everything, but she still knew nothing. They’d speak without ever exchanging a word, and she would squeeze her wrist lightly when she stood to refill their mugs. She’d answer questions until she didn’t, and she’d ask until she stopped. Ebbing and flowing, the conversations went, and that’s how they left it.

It was beyond words, in a way, and so much lesser in another. Honest. Arduous. Cryptic and impossible and, depending on how you looked at it, completely pointless. She wishes everything were so easy.

She thinks that she knew—about her, what she was and what she wasn’t—or suspected, at the very least. She’d never said anything, not with words, but she’d say it in other ways—the way she’d roll over when she would crawl back into bed in the dead of night, and silently wrap an arm around her waist; the way she’d make no comment about the plain, dark clothes that would appear and vanish in their closet without explanation; the way she’d turn the news off when she switched it on in the morning and locked their fingers together as they drank tea over the papers; the way she never said a word.

See? Communication.

***

She wished—

Oh, god, she _wished_.

***

There’s a house on the junction of Satellite Street and Fifth Avenue. Boards that hadn’t been there when the house had been sold are nailed across the windows on the first floor. The windows on the second floor are shuttered. Daffodils grow in the front yard, and the roof is covered in dead leaves and fallen branches.

He was tired. Tired and scared, and ready to give up. She’d time it perfectly. He wouldn’t have fought.

Except she was wrong.

Nine shots. Six hits. She still couldn't stand fireworks.

Trembling on a porch, gasping for air, spreading pools of red, and pain that was so much more than just physical. Hands that couldn’t move, a heart that couldn’t beat, and eyes that could do nothing but watch as two more bullets sunk into her heart.

***

 _Rose_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :'/


	4. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You don’t?” He waved a hand around the room. “He’s trying to prove a point, and he’s trying to be sophisticated about it.”
> 
> “Sounds like someone I know."

_“I want you to picture a door.”_

_She can’t hold back her snort. She hears the rustle of papers. “Is something funny?”_

_“Sorry,” she says, and she knows he knows she doesn’t mean it. “It’s just—I read a book like this, once.”_

_“Oh?”_

_“Yeah,” she said. “Pretty sad, actually. He lost it and killed himself.” She grins toothily. “Sign of things to come, eh?”_

_“I’d hope not.”_

_“Right,” she says. “Of course.” She waits until she hears him draw in another breath. “It wasn’t even that good,” she says, cutting him off. “No way it could have been. I mean, I’m all for ‘no such thing as a bad idea’ and all that, but some concepts just really don’t—”_

_“Jane—”_

_“Theta.”_

_“Theta. Concentrate, please?”_

_“Right.” She nods. “Door, right.”_

_“Yes. You see it?”_

_“Yep.”_

_“Good. Now—eyes closed, Theta—I want you to open it.”_

_“Corridors, right?”_

_“Just the one door for now, please.”_

_“Right.” She reaches forwards blindly and grabs at the air. “Opening the door.” She twists her wrists, and makes a squeak in the back of her throat. “Ooh. Might need to oil that. Put it on the list.”_

_He chuckles, and she bites the inside of her cheek. “In the room,” he says, “I want you to imagine—”_

_“Hold on,” she interrupts, eyes flying open again. His lips tighten, but she barges on. “Who says it's a room? Why not a door leading outside? Or into another hallway? Or a balcony, or a closet, or,_ ooh _, what about a room that hasn’t been built yet, or just another wall? Much better than a plain old room, I’d say—”_

_“J—Theta.” The doctor looks so tired she almost feels bad. “Eyes. Please.”_

_She sighs and squeezes her eyes shut again, but not before she makes sure he can see her roll them. “Eyes,” she mutters._

_“Good,” he praises. She bites back a scoff. “Do you see the room?”_

_“Clear as day,” she drawls._

_“There’s a table in front of you, and two chairs.”_

_“Hm. Never liked interviews. Only ever had the one, but that was just—”_

_“Do you see the table?”_

_She exhales through her nose. “Yes,” she permits._

_“Look up—in your mind, Theta. Look up. Who’s sitting across from you?”_

_“Hold on!” she protests. “You haven’t told me to sit down yet.”_

_She can almost hear him grinding his teeth. “Sit down, then,” he bites out. “Now, I want you to think, alright? Just think—don’t talk back, not now. In a room, any room, at a table like this—who is sitting across from you?”_

_(It’s a suite, almost, one fit for a suitor or a king. Black stone walls and marble floors, and drapings the colour of the midnight sky hiding empty windows. He’d always been fond of the little details.)_

_“Theta?” he prompts._

_(He’d laugh at her, she imagines, for the Trimalchian display, glowering in that wounded way of his that was almost a laugh.)_

_“I don’t know,” she lies. “There’s no one.”_

***

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“Good morning to you too,” he said drily. “I was in a session with Harkness when the call came.”

“Aren’t phones supposed to be off in the office?” she asked.

“Have you ever tried to get him to follow a rule?”

“Right.” She glanced over to where the man in question stood, talking to a librarian (and winking at them, but that was par for the course). “So, what are you doing here?”

“I asked.”

“What, to come?”

“No, for a wand and an Invisibility Cloak,” he drawled.

“It’s a library,” said Theta drily. “Not exactly Gringotts.” She glanced around again. “What, he _let_ you come?” She let her tone of voice speak for exactly what she thought of that idea.

“I can be _very_ persuasive.”

She made a face and marched past and up the steps. She didn’t bother to check whether he’d followed.

***

There was a woman—or what was left of her, at least—in the front hall, slumped over on a throne of books. Strands of hair hung like dark silk curtains over her face, reminding Theta of black shrouds draped over gilded gold portraits.

A hand, stripped roughly to the bone, hung over an armrest of outdated encyclopedias, and Theta crouched, holding her own beneath it. She could, she imagined, thread her fingers through the dead woman’s and clasp their palms together—there was sinew enough to hold her together, and some clinging flesh still for a mockery of touch.

 _Mockery_. There it was.

_Airy and vapid, a paper-thin veneer over an empty pit of nothing, and she disgusted him._

_You’d think the face would be a good place to stop, wouldn’t you? Why waste your energy? Tire yourself? You wouldn’t bother, if you really saw yourself as above her, would you? And why leave the hair? Well, it is very nice hair, I suppose._

_It was nothing personal, nothing personal enough to garner this, but it was enough. Flimsy and fake and superficial, and full of half-formed fantasies that were scarcely enough to fill a child’s hands, and slow, too._

_Nah, it wasn’t that. Well, it was that. But not that. Not completely. She doesn’t matter. But she does. But not to him. Not enough, anyways. What? Wait, no._

_What are you really trying to do?_

_Gosh, what a waste of time. You even gave the throne wings._

_She was lesser, so he made her so_.

She dropped her hand and stood, stepping back.

_Dispassionate and distant, but aloof and brutal all the same. A face that was familiar in the way a waiter’s, or an actor’s was. An acquaintanceship formed between strangers by way of ignorance and impersonal disdain._

_Something like that, at least._

_You’ve been busy_.

_What makes a man?_ she could ask. _What is the sum of the parts, the finished product, the whole? What makes a person a person, and what is it that he took away that made her something else,_ and a hundred other questions in the same vein.

She didn't.

“It’s hard to tell how long she’s been here,” said Martha. She reached to brush a strand of hair away, and it fell away at her touch, catching on the bloody edges of where a lip had once been. “I’ll know better, once we get her back to the morgue.” Her lips were pursed and bitten white, but her hands were still as she snapped a photo of gleaming white bone carpeted in ragged red.

“Can’t have been earlier than eleven last night,” said Jack. There was a hard set to his face as he looked around the room, never lingering long enough on anything to do more than glance over. “Half past, actually,” he corrected, shifting his weight, tapping the tip of his cane almost absent-mindedly against the carpet. _Thup-thup-thup-thup_. Too fast to be a heartbeat, too slow to make Theta think of anything else. “That’s when they locked up.”

“She’d have been dead before that,” said Martha. “She was skinned—butchered—before he brought her here. Had to have been. There’d be blood everywhere, otherwise.”

Grim. Grim, grim, grim.

A creak of old tile beneath stiff carpeting, and a shift in the corner of her eye as someone moved to stand next to her. “So,” said Koschei.

Their shoulders were brushing. Theta shifted to the side, and Koschei put his hands in his pockets. “So,” said Theta.

“So?” Koschei nodded at the body.

She frowned and twisted her neck to look at him. “Are you even allowed to be here?”

He shrugged. “Do you care?” he asked. “Besides, nobody stopped me.”

She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “Seen a body before, Dr. Oakdown?”

He blinked slowly. “It’s an occupational hazard.”

“Really?” It came out flat.

“Never at a crime scene,” he confessed. “Never actually been to a crime scene.” She snorted. “Well—read books. Seen shows.”

“It’s not exactly _CSI_ ,” said Theta drily.

“No,” Koschei agreed. “So, how does it work?”

Theta’s mouth curled. “It’s more of a glorified guessing game, really,” she said.

“Which you’re good at.”

She chewed her inner lip. “S’pose so.”

“Well,” he inclined his head at the body. “See anything?”

“What do you see?” she countered.

“I’m not here to consult.”

_Then what are you here for?_ “Then consider it a favour.” Theta stepped back and gestured at the body. “Go on, doctor,” she said, trying very hard not to sneer. “Dazzle me.”

Koschei stared at her, and Theta met his gaze stubbornly. With a sigh, he ran a hand through his hair and turned his gaze to the corpse, a twist in his lip that suggested she ought to be thanking him for humouring her, and a spark in his eyes that she couldn’t have put a name to if she tried. “It feels childish,” he said. Theta raised an eyebrow. “The whole thing stinks of petulance,” he told her. “Someone inexperienced, but vicious. There was care put into this, too much care.” Care, too, was in his words—care to be calm, to speak plainly, to be neutral and unaffected.

_Water. Koschei! Help me!_

She forced herself to swallow. “Read a lot of Thomas Harris, do you?”

He shrugged. “They think they’re clever, cleverer than they really are, and they have an ego.” He glanced at her, eyes glimmering. “Just a guess.”

“You get ‘childish’ from that?” she asked.

“You don’t?” He waved a hand around the room. “A library,” he said. “He’s trying to prove a point, and he’s trying to be sophisticated about it.”

_Vicious._

_Art or anger? A vision?_

_Vicion. Heh_.

“Sounds like someone I know,” said Theta quietly.

Koschei snapped his head around to look at her, and she turned before he could meet her eyes. “Inexperienced is right,” she said, tucking her other hand into a pocket and ignoring his gaze even as it burnt a hole into the side of her skull. “Maybe not in killing, but in presentation, definitely. Stripping the meat from her bones. . . that _means_ something to him.” She clenched her fist, nails dragging across her palm, and she imagined her skin peeling off in curls beneath them, gathering and rotting against her nailbed. “Whoever he is, he fancies himself an artist. No—” She shook her head. “Not an artist,” she corrected. “Architect. Building a shrine of bodies to himself and everything he thinks he’s a symbol of.”

“Do you think it’s your Master?” Koschei asked. His voice dragged, the words lingering like oil across the surface of the water. A test?

Maybe. That sounded like him.

“Doesn’t fit,” she said. “The Master is elegant. Mad as a hatter, obviously—” Koschei’s nose twitched, and she could almost imagine it was out of amusement, “—but still elegant. Stylish. He praises himself on his aesthetic. If this is his work, then it’s subpar. No. . .” She crouched, staring up into the empty red sockets where eyes had once been. _What colour had they been?_ she wondered. “‘Sides, this isn’t his usual M.O. Presentation, at least.” Brown was always a safe guess. Brown, or blue, or that muddy green colour somewhere in between that wasn’t quite hazel, but couldn’t reasonably be called anything else. “An imitation,” she said. “A careful one, but a weak one. Pale copy. Think—” she waved a hand idly, “—broken printer. Bad photograph. Cheap photocopy.” She cocked her head. “Scantron?”

“What.”

“Scantron. You know, the scanning thing?” She waved her hands, and made a buzzing hum at the back of her throat. “No?”

“That’s. . . not what it is.”

“Oh.” She glanced over her shoulder. The lines around his mouth and eyes were tight, and his hands were buried deep in his pockets. She imagined him clenching his fists, knuckles white, and held back a smirk.

They weren’t children anymore.

“Well,” she turned. “Basically, what I’m saying, Dr. Oakdown,” she said, “is that I think we have a copycat.”


	5. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Manipulation._ She would know.
> 
> _It’s like a drug. It lingers._
> 
> God. Talk about ego.

Sometimes, when it got to be too much—when she felt like the walls were closing in on her, when she couldn’t hear anything over the pounding of the blood in her ears, when she couldn’t close her eyes without seeing blood and broken bodies and _her_ —she would run.

Not anywhere in particular. Just run.

It was freeing in a way that little else was; to let go, and let her legs take her where they pleased, for her panting for air to drown out the voices in her head and the burning in her muscles wash away the tingling at the tips of her fingers. To just _go_ , and let the world be someone else’s problem for once. At the very least, it let her move, and that was better than nothing.

Running, running, _running_. Always running. She never seemed to get any further, though.

Sometimes, she felt like she could keep running forever, until the stars imploded and the sun gave out, and the only limit was how far the universe could stretch. Other times, it was like she was being driven up a treadmill on her last legs, and the only thing keeping her up were adrenaline and what passed for will and whatever thing was chasing her.

Today, it was the latter.

She collapsed to her knees with a gasp, lungs rattling as she dragged in breath after breath. Her hands shook as she ran them through her hair, and she realized they were covered in scratches. Her face, too, probably.

She fell on her face and rolled over, throwing her arms out beside her. Her skin would be splotched with dirt, she knew, and her clothes, too, but she just couldn’t bring herself to care.

Besides, dirt was good. Told you things. Hid stuff. Crunchy.

She closed her eyes, letting her breaths even out and her chest stop heaving. Content, for the moment. It would be over soon, she knew, and she would have to stand up and trudge back to her flat and the rest of the world, but, for now, that was what she was. Content.

She let her mind drift as she played with the earth beneath her fingers, sifting through the pebbles and the loose soil. She could hear the branches overhead rustling in the breeze and the air was bitter with the sharp scent of pine. Elsewhere in the woods, an owl hooted, and the bushes nearby rustled.

Something dropped onto her forehead, sticky and warm. She twitched, wrinkling her nose as she rubbed it off. Water? But it hadn’t been raining—

Oh.

She stared at the streaks of red smudged across the back of her hand. Another drop fell onto her wrist, and she watched as it slowly rolled down her arm, staining the hem of her sleeve.

She looked up. There was a man in the trees—or something that had once been a man, at least. She wasn’t foolish enough to believe that that’s what it was, anymore.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone.

“Hi,” she said before it had even finished ringing. “There’s a body.”

***

No ID. Of course there wasn’t any ID.

Or clothes, for that matter. Theta made a note to check Missing Persons. She could only hope Mr. Doe wasn’t a recluse.

_Or maybe he was. There’s appeal in that, isn’t there? Easy. Is easy what you want?_

_Nah. Easy doesn’t cost anything. No one goes to this much trouble for nobody._

_So. Who are you, Odysseus?_

There was a loud clattering noise, not unlike a box of tin cans being hurled out a window, and a screech of metal on metal that set Theta’s teeth on edge. Martha stood to the side, directing a group of SOCO who stood around a tree, steadying a ladder.

_She knocked on his door, and it creaked open._

_Branches, huh? Would’ve thought you’d go for thistles. Or is that the point?_

_Bet he was loud, wasn’t he? Rude? Bit of a dick? Or maybe he wasn’t. After all, you’re not normal, are you? You know it. He knows it. Knew it, at least. Somehow. Some way._

_Pity. A mockery of kindness. That’s a theme, is it? Mockery, I mean._

_But not quite?_

“That’d be difficult, wouldn’t it?” asked Jack. His hands were tucked into his pockets, and his greatcoat buttoned all the way up to his neck. “The sticks, I mean.”

Theta huffed, breath misting in front of her. “I’d say so, yeah.” She licked her lips, chapped by the chill night wind. Her tongue brushed a scratch to the corner of her mouth.

_Big lengths to go to. You don’t strike me as an overachiever._

“He’d have needed tools, then. Supplies. Pretty big ladder, too.”

“Mhm.”

_What are you trying to prove?_

“What do you think?”

“Big ladder,” she repeated. “Yep. Imagine carrying that through the woods.”

“Killer backache,” Jack agreed. Theta glared at him, and he put his hands up. “Okay, okay. But I meant about the body.”

Theta rubbed her wrist, absent-mindedly tracing the path his blood had made. “Fresh,” she said. “Fresh enough, at least. The blood wasn’t even congealed I found it—” she paused for a second. Jack raised an eyebrow, and she continued. “There’s no way he’d have been able to position him like _that_ after rigor mortis.” Theta glanced at the removal team. Two officers held onto the bottom of a ladder, and another was making their way carefully up it. The rest stood in a small circle around them, watching. Absurdly, it reminded Theta of show-and-tell, or maybe the world’s weirdest fairy circle. Maybe. Did people stand in fairy circles? Probably not. “Two hours at the most, I’d say. Maybe more?” She shrugged. “I’m not forensics. Ask Martha.”

He gave her a look. “He worked fast,” he concluded. “Planned.”

Theta shrugged. “Or he knew how to relax the muscles. Or he kept him warm. Or maybe he positioned him while he was alive, or killed him here.”

Jack groaned, dragging his hand down his face. “So, basically,” he said into his palm, “what you’re saying is we’re looking for a either really pissed-off masseuse or an art major with serious anger issues.”

“If you like.”

Jack dragged his fingers through his hair. He looked tired, more tired than usual. But it was—Theta checked her watch—two a.m., so she supposed that was fair. Behind him, SOCO-with-short-arms hopped up and down, holding a saw by the tip of the blade up to SOCO-on-the-ladder. They looked to be struggling.

Jack sighed. “Body,” he repeated. “Arms out, legs together, stabbed through with sticks. . . remind you of anything?”

“No.”

“No, it doesn’t?”

“No, he’s not a martyr, Jack,” said Theta. “He didn’t die for our sins, either.”

_What are you to me, a god without a voice?_

“You’re sure?” He glanced over his shoulder skeptically. SOCO-on-the-ladder had finally gotten their hands on the handle, and was sawing at the branch the body had been stuck on. The rough, grating noise made the hair on the back of Theta’s neck stand up, and she dragged her palm roughly across the inside of her pocket.

“Yep.” She nodded.

Jack tugged on his ear and cast a weary glance around the scene. With a final creak and splintering crack, the branch was severed. SOCO-on-the-ground began shouting, and SOCO-with-short-arms and SOCO-with-the-lopsided-mask dragged a tarp to lay beneath the tree. SOCO-on-the-ladder yelled something, and threw the saw to the ground. “Okay,” he said. “Okay.”

“What?”

Jack ground the tip of his cane against the dirt. “It’s late,” he said. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

She stared up at him. “That’s it?”

“Yeah. Go home.” He gave her a quizzical look. “What, what’s the problem?”

“Nothing. Just—” Two SOCOs walked by, pushing a stretcher, Johnny covered awkwardly with a cloth that didn’t quite do the job. The wheels rattled against the forest floor and there was a flurry of squawks as what birds hadn’t been scared off by the earlier commotion took flight. “I mean, first on scene, right? You don’t want to ask me anything?”

“You’ve already told me everything,” said Jack, brow furrowed. His expression cleared as it dawned on him. “Wait, are you asking me to interrogate you?”

“What? No.” She jammed her other hand into her pocket. “Just—”

“I mean,” a lecherous grin spread across his face and he wiggled his brows, “not that I wouldn’t mind—”

She smacked his arm and the leer vanished, replaced by a pained wince. “Stop it.”

He rubbed his arm, grimacing. “You’ve found bodies before,” he said. He frowned. “You okay?”

“Hm.” She rolled her heel against the ground, flattening the earth beneath it. “Yep.” She moved her foot, and the dirt sprung back like a sponge. “Yup,” she said. “Gonna head home now.” She turned and marched away, back the way she came. Branches were hanging limply where she’d broken them, leaves scattered over the ground and bushes drooping sadly where she’d burst through. She winced. There was a reason she always found another way back.

“You need a ride?” Jack called after her, but she was already gone.

***

“Another body.”

“Another body.”

“How are you feeling?”

“Is that a follow-up, or unrelated?”

“Everything’s related.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Guess so.” She shrugged. “I’m fine.”

“Are you?”

Theta peeled her hands away from her face and craned her neck to peer at him. He looked back, annoyance evident even upside-down. “Do you actually care?”

“Would you answer the question if I said yes?”

“Don’t need to. Already have.” She swung her legs over the back of the couch and sat up straight in one swift, fluid motion. “Why were you there last week?” she asked, blinking away the dark spots. “At the library?”

“Do you think it’s the same person?” he asked. “The copycat?”

She narrowed her eyes. “It fits,” she said. “Whoever killed these people was careful. Too careful. The Master’s never been this cautious, ‘cause he knows he doesn’t have to be. Desperate, too,” she added. “Younger, I’d say, smart enough, thinks he’s smarter than he is. Trying to make himself more important. _Miming manipulation_. Why were you there?”

“I told you.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“Did you ask Jack?”

“Not that,” she said. “I know _how_ you got there. Why, though?”

He tapped out a beat on his armrest and, right as Theta was sure he was going to change the subject, said, “Because I wanted to.”

“Why?” she pressed.

He shrugged. “Call if a whim. An impulse. I was curious.”

“What, about a dead body?”

“Weren’t you?”

“Sure,” she said. “But it’s my job. It’s not yours.”

“Not exactly a crime, is it?”

“What?”

“Death,” he said. “Being curious about it, that is. Causing it. . .” He twisted his face thoughtfully. “Not so much.”

“You know, most people would be less calm around a body,” said Theta, hooking a foot over her leg. “Especially one that looked like that.”

“You weren’t,” he said.

Her nails skated up her shin, catching on her trousers. “Can I ask you something?”

“Can I stop you?”

“That night,” she said. “Well, day. Week? Not sure, sort of lost track of time.” She shook her head. “What did you do?”

“When?”

She clenched her fist, fabric bunching in her hand. “I think you know.”

The corner of his lips twitched minutely. “And I think you know.”

“Right, wrong question.” She dug her nails into the bundle of cloth until they throbbed. “Why?”

He clicked his pen. “What’s death?”

“Nope.” She shook her head. “No. Not doing this.”

“Doing what?” He spread his hands innocently. “It’s just a question, Theta.”

“Answer mine first.”

He pursed his lips and dropped his hands. She held his gaze unwaveringly. He exhaled hard, nostrils flaring. “Because I wanted to,” he said stiffly.

“Why?”

He dragged his teeth over his tongue. “Try explaining an urge to a three-year old.” He shrugged. “Because I could. Because—” He shrugged again. “Don’t know. I’m the one asking the questions here.”

Theta dragged a breath in through her teeth and sagged back against the couch. “Jack,” she said slowly, “says death’s like a bramble. It clings to you, and holds, and leaves traces no matter what you do.” Or something along those lines. He’d been on his fourth beer, and slurring more than a few words.

“I know what he thinks,” said Koschei.

She cocked an eyebrow. “It’s all metaphors, right?” she said. “Can’t exactly get the answer wrong.”

“What’s your metaphor?”

She ground the point of her tooth against her tongue. _Metaphors_. Easy enough, right?

“It’s like a drug,” she finally said. “It lingers.”

“Do you think?”

She wet her lips. “It’s there,” she said. “Somewhere in the backdrop. In your memories, in _you_. It’s not something you can just wave your hand and get rid of. It’s. . .” She tapped her finger against her thigh. “Background noise. Something. You never stop chasing the high.” She wrinkled her nose. “Sort of?”

“Sort of?”

“Sort of. _Is_.”

“Background noise,” he repeated.

“What about you?” she asked.

“What do I think?” She nodded. He shrugged. “Could be any of those. Means different things to different people, right?” He titled his head by a fraction. “Everyone sees something else.”

Theta plucked at her sleeve. “I did miss you,” she said.

“You could have bothered to show it.”

When she left, she definitely did _not_ slam the door shut behind her.

***

He remembered Theta, in the way a dried-out riverbed remembers the water, or a house remembers a master long since passed, or the Earth remembers space. Gone and far away, but always there, hovering over his shoulder.

He remembered towering stone walls, and empty classrooms, and fields and forests that stretched for what felt like miles. He remembered tires crunching down a gravel road, and chasing dandelion tufts under grey skies and even greyer clouds.

He remembered rocks scraping against his cheek, and the tang of iron, and watching as the river carried a pale, slip of a form downstream.

He remembered blood beneath her nails and holding her hand under a sky full of stars.

 _Manipulation_. She would know.

 _It’s like a drug. It lingers_.

God. Talk about ego.


	6. do you see me now? i’m right here, behind the mirror.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He wasn’t very nice to her, but she wasn’t very nice to him, either, so he supposed it balanced out.
> 
> He wondered when it had all gone to shit.

His childhood stood out to him in the forefront of his mind, vivid and still, like a series of photos laid out neatly in an album, or an oil painting of roadkill three days old. What was that they said about time slowing before a disaster?

Something like that, except for a decade of his life.

“Troubled child.” That’s what they’d called him. “Ill. Unwell.” No specific terms—they’d thought him too young—but he had an idea of what they were saying behind the door. He _was_ a doctor, after all.

There was irony in that, he thought. No, not irony—wrong word. Incongruous? Not him being troubled, the other thing.

He’d come to school late, by almost three months—an eternity, back then. What he’d give to have that back.

He remembered the crunch of gravel beneath tires, the chill of the car window when he pressed his forehead against it, the sting in his palms when the edges of the seatbelt dug into his skin.

_Be good_ , he remembered them saying. _Play nice. Do well_. Yada yada yada. A hug, stiff and awkward, a firm hand on his shoulder that was just a bit too heavy and sent him stumbling. The rumble of a motor, and they were gone, a speck in the distance leaving nothing but a trail of smoke behind.

And him.

He hadn’t gone to class—no point, not on the first day. The woman at the front desk, with the long dress and dangling jewelry, and a smile so bright and stretched so wide it had scared him, offered to stay, to lead him to the library, to show him the grounds. He’d nodded, politely, meekly. The moment she glanced away, he’d turned and bolted, charging down the halls on little legs that hadn’t grown nearly as much as he’d hoped since then.

He’d thought about that day a lot through the years. Strange, the way things happen. What would have happened, back then and afterwards and now, if he’d gone another way. If he’d turned left instead of right, gone up the stairs or out the doors instead of down the hall. If he’d paid a little more attention to where he’d been going instead of glancing over his shoulder so much.

If he hadn’t crashed into her.

A loud yelp, a squeaking, skidding noise, and he was on his back, head throbbing, palms burning. She’d winced as she clambered to her feet, her knees skinned an angry, pinkish red.

For a moment, they’d just stared at each other.

Funny, how long a second can last.

And then she’d grabbed him, thin, pale fingers gripping his wrist tightly enough to cut off circulation, and dragged him into an alcove.

“Hey!” he’d protested, which he thought had been fair of him.

She’d already been on the ground, arranging her skirt over neatly folded legs. Begrudgingly, he’d slid down the wall and slumped onto the ground to face her. Such was the way of children.

“What are you running away from?” she’d asked.

“What makes you think I’m running away from anything?” he’d asked. The alcove had been small, an empty space beneath the stairs you wouldn’t have spotted unless you were looking, _really_ looking. Cobwebs had hung from the slanted ceiling, brushing the tops of their heads, and they were practically squished against each other, but, back then, it had felt like the biggest place in the world. Like a secret cave.

“Well,” she’d said, the perfect picture of reason, “you’re running, and now you’re hiding. Most people don’t do that for fun.”

“You’re doing it,” he’d said. “Sort of.”

“Yeah, but I’m not most people.” She’d tilted her chin up pompously, and he’d felt like hitting her.

“Oh, yeah?” he’d sneered. “What makes you so special?”

“I’m very smart,” she’d said, clearly and plainly, like she was stating a fact.

“That’s stupid,” he’d said bluntly.

She’d nodded sagely. “Sounds like something a smart person would say.” There’d been a band-aid across her nose, and her hair had been a burnt reddish-brown, tangled into two ponytails that bore striking resemblances to the heads of mops. She’d looked about his age and, seriously, what lunatic had thought it was a good idea to lock a bunch of eight-year-olds up in a castle in the middle of nowhere? It was a catastrophe waiting to happen.

(Hardee-har-har.)

“Are you new too?” he’d asked.

“No,” she’d said. “Why, are you?”

“Obviously,” he’d said with a sniff, looking down his nose at her with disdain. Sometimes, back home, when he’d felt well enough to get out of bed, he’d sneak around the house and listen to his parents, the programs they’d left playing all day on the telly, the phone calls that always left his father either strutting around the house, pleased as punch, or sour-faced and growling and snarling at anyone who came near. He’d gotten used to imitating their haughty tones.

“How old are you?” she’d demanded.

“Eight,” he’d said.

“Oh.” She’d beamed—she’d cycled through emotions like they were pairs of socks, back then. Still did, it seemed. It used to send him reeling. “Me too!”

“Okay,” he’d said. Not the starting point one would expect, but a starting point nonetheless. He wasn’t very nice to her, but she wasn’t very nice to him, either, so he supposed it balanced out.

He wondered when it had all gone to shit.

***

“What,” Koschei had said one cold December night.

Theta had grinned, hair fluttering in the breeze. “Hiya!”

“What,” Koschei had repeated.

Theta had gestured at him to move over and, after a brief scramble, grabbed the edges of the windowsill and swung into his room. Koschei had leapt backwards, wrinkling his nose, as chunks of dirty snow tumbled in along with her, landing on the carpet.

“Vansell’s at home this week,” Theta had said in way of explanation, patting her hands dry against her coat. He’d wrinkled his nose at the wet brown stains she’d left and took a quick step out of arm’s reach.

“I know,” Koschei had said, watching her shrug out of her soiled coat (big and bulky and a shocking shade of highlighter yellow that he had no doubt she’d picked out herself) and kick off her boots.

She’d made a humming noise and flopped onto the armchair into the corner of the room. “The roof is nice,” she’d said. “You should come with me, sometime.”

He’d craned his neck to look up at the ceiling. “Is it cold?” he’d asked.

“Mhm.” Theta had been fiddling with the afghan Vansell had left slung across the back of the chair, twisting the fringe between her fingers.

“You’re stupid,” he’d informed her, as was custom at that point. She’d scrunched her face up in his direction, and he’d stuck out his tongue in retaliation. He’d flopped back down onto his bed and picked up the book he’d been flipping idly through when he’d heard the knock on the window. “Are you gonna stay there?”

“Yep,” she’d said, popping the P and pulling the afghan around her shoulders. She’d looked ridiculous, he’d thought, sitting there in pajamas that looked like they’d been through a shredder (knowing her, they probably had), feet not quite touching the ground.

He’d drifted off at some point, lulled to sleep by the rustle of frost-covered branches outside and the mind-numbingly dull plot of his book, her chatter fading into calming background noise.

When he’d woken up, she’d been gone, along with the biscuits he’d hidden in his desk.

***

Koschei supposed that, to some, he would have been considered a bully. It certainly was what he’d fancied himself, at the time. Theta too—partners in crime, in a sense. But only to a few. To most, they were just another duo of wandering weirdos. The nutter who never went to class and the serious one that coughed a lot, he once heard a janitor say.

They’d left a lot of messes.

They’d been close, she hadn’t lied about that. Maybe not him to her in the sense that she wanted, or her to him in the sense that he wanted, but close. Very close.

Predictably, this hadn’t been much help to either of them in their social pursuits.

Scuffles in the hallway were normal, expected, even, and if Koschei had a penny for every jibe and sneer that had made his stomach twist—their friendship, Theta’s family, his _condition_ —he wouldn’t have had to stay at all. Yet, somehow, _they_ were still the ones who’d get into trouble when they’d retaliate.

He remembered the glare that had been on Theta’s face as she’d watched Torvic, in all four and a half feet of compressed smugness and meanness, saunter out of the office, blameless, for the upteenth time. “‘M gonna kill ‘im,” she’d muttered around her puffy lip, and he’d nodded fervently.

He missed those days.

***

Oh, right. _That’s_ when it had started veering off to hell.

***

Theta had grown bolder as time passed, and so had he. Sneaking across the roof of the dorms was, as Theta had declared, with all the smugness of the cat that had gotten the cream, “child’s play.”

“We are children,” Koschei had pointed out.

“Yeah, but we’re _better_.”

There was scarcely a day when they weren’t clambering over the roof or down the walls, or even through the gap in the gate and into the fields and woods beyond. Koschei hadn’t been foolish enough to believe that nobody knew, or that they were the only ones, though he suspected Theta might have been. He’d just counted himself lucky that nobody had phoned home.

Was it luck, he sometimes found himself thinking sometimes, or the opposite that had led him to follow them that night? Had it been the greatest thing to ever happen to them, or the worst? Philosophical and never-ending, and with more answers than he could shake a stick at, and not a single one of them clearer than a solid wall. Infuriating to no end. Sometimes he thought he’d chosen the wrong profession.

“When do you suppose the aliens are going to come?” Theta had asked. She’d taken her shoes off, despite the lingering chill, and was splashing her feet absent-mindedly in the river. It had been a big river, or big enough, and, sometimes, after the longest autumn storms, they would have to shout to hear each other over the rush of white water.

Not that night, though. That night, the water had been as gentle as a brook or a light spring breeze, breaking around Theta’s ankles and the smooth, worn stones in little ripples that Koschei had loved to drag his fingers through.

He’d contemplated the question for a moment, wrinkling his forehead and staring at the leaf he’d been shredding as if he might find the answer written in the veins. “Soon, I imagine,” he’d decided.

“I think they should hurry, don’t you?” Theta had said. “Earth’s boring. This part of Earth, at least.” She’d flopped back onto the bank, mindless of the pebbles digging into her back, kicking her legs and splashing water all over the both of them. “I’m dying down here!”

He never did learn the full story of what had happened that night. It wasn’t like they could have asked.

All he knew was that, one moment, he’d been sat on the bank, watching her braid a twig into her hair, and, in the next, he’d been knocked to the ground. The ensuing scuffle was but a blur in his memory, something he’d curse until the end of time because _fuck_.

He’d ended up losing (or what had constituted losing at the moment), and being kicked across the rocks. He still had the scar—a barely-there line, thin and white, across his shoulder—to prove it. There had been shouting, he remembered, and someone had been screaming—him or Theta or Torvic or all three of them, or maybe that had just been the noise in his head.

And then the water.

Theta had maintained that it had been purposeful. Koschei still believed he hadn’t had the faintest clue what he was doing. Not that it mattered.

The whole affair had been ridiculous, something more than clear to him now, looking back. A scuffle on the bank. But he could still appreciate what he’d felt at the time, which had been fear. Fear, and panic, and not much else. Desperation, too, and adrenaline. Very primal of him.

He could have drowned. He probably would have. Or maybe not. Who was he to know what had been going through the other boy’s head?

(Or maybe he knew too well. Not at the time, though. Not enough.)

And then—

_And then—_

He’d remember that moment for the rest of his life.

He hadn’t realized what had happened, not immediately. But Torvic’s weight had vanished, and he’d hauled himself out of the water, gagging and sputtering and spitting and shivering. It hadn’t been an instantaneous reaction, or one of horror or shock, like he’d seen described in stories. He’d scrubbed at his face with wet hands, rubbing at the sand and grit in his eyes, and it had taken him a few moments more to figure out why the water running down his arms was warm, and what that _obnoxious fucking banging_ was.

It wouldn’t have taken a genius to see he was dead. Theta had still been swinging. Down and down and down and down. Splatters of blood had rained across her chest, her arms, her face, her hair, and he hadn’t been able to see her face.

“Theta,” he’d rasped, then coughed, more water spilling down his chin. “Theta,” he repeated. “Thete!”

A final swing and she’d stumbled back, stumbling on the rocky bank. Koschei had forced himself to his feet and staggered forwards. His legs had been shaking, though whether that had been from almost drowning (he’d regarded everything with a calmness that had almost been hysterical) or the body at his feet he hadn’t known. Still didn’t.

All in all, it had probably happened in a few seconds. But who could blame him for feeling like it had been an eternity?

He’d heard a thud, and the rattling of stones against each other. “I didn’t—” A breath like a death rattle, shaking hands reaching forwards. “He—”

Koschei had stepped over the body and kicked the bloody rock into the river. It had hit the water with a _plop_ , and the droplets from the splash had been cold against his skin. “Theta,” he’d repeated, not for any particular reason—or one that he could think of, at least. Reassurance?

A hand on his sleeve, and he’d pulled her to her feet. How long had they stood there? His hair had been dry and his teeth chattering by the time she’d spoken again.

She’d cleared her throat, and her fingers twitched around his. “Water,” she’d whispered, voice hoarse.

She’d let go of him and crouched, grabbing his (its?) arms. “Water,” she’d repeated, voice stronger, dragging him (it) towards the bank. “Koschei!” she’d snapped when he didn’t move. “ _Help me_.”

He’d heard somewhere, maybe in a film, that the body lost weight after death—the soul leaving the body. Or maybe that was just the water.

It had taken almost ten minutes to wade away from the rocky area by the shore, delayed slightly by Theta slipping and getting her foot stuck between two boulders, and another one to maneuver the body and push it away into the stronger currents.

And then they’d just stood there, waist-deep in a river neither of them were sure they had the strength to pull themselves or each other out of, watching the moonlight break against the water.

She’d never brought it up again, and neither had he.

***

It was almost laughable how desperate they’d been to make everything seem normal. They hadn’t needed to at all.

Not that nobody had noticed—it’s always rather difficult to overlook a missing child. He’d seen maybe one or two police officers on the first day, overheard a phone call on the third, and then nothing. He’d expected them to forget about him, but the speed at which everything had blown over had been astounding—nothing to spoil their good reputation, he supposed. Better to say a troubled child had run away then admit to having lost a perfectly normal one.

Troubled child. That’s what they’d started calling him.

They’d found the body a week later, bloated and rotted almost beyond recognition (or so he’d heard), caught on an overhanging branch a few miles down the River Irvine. Slipped and fell. How sad. This is why you have curfew. Their condolences. Please file all paperwork to a third-party outsource.

Torvic haunted the halls the way a graveyard haunts a highway, which is to say he didn’t. His room was cleaned, his name wiped from lists and his projects sorted neatly into files that vanished into cabinets that would never open again. There wasn’t anywhere a ghost could linger.

Nobody had even looked in their direction, and he’d felt his first stirs of what he’d later learn was called vindication.

***

If Koschei were more poetic, he’d have described their relationship as waves against a shore.

He didn’t want poetry. That had always been her.

There would be weeks where the most he’d see of her would be a flash of russet hair in the corridor, and she’d once gone a month skipping every class they’d shared (Which was, unfortunately, most of them. He’d ended up tracking her down in the art studio a week into the latest session of her silent treatment, and ended up with a tub of paste upended over his head for his troubles). Never for any reason he was privy to, and always coming back on her own terms. Never apologizing, either, or offering explanations; just sliding into the seat next to him or kicking his window open in the dead of night, regardless of time or roommates.

“It’s an asylum,” she’d stated one night, as blunt and self-assured as their very first conversation where she’d proclaimed her own cleverness, after a week of leaving every time he entered a room. She’d been lying upside-down on Vansell’s bed, hair brushing the floor and feet kicked up against the wall. Her heels had left scuffs on his posters that the other boy hadn’t stopped bitching about for weeks. “Clearly.” She’d hit another growth spurt recently, and her limbs had been long and gangly, like those of a newborn foal. She’d relished towering over him.

“Obviously,” he’d agreed, scratching out a word in his essay.

That wasn’t to say that he’d been entirely blameless, though. Fine, _maybe_ he’d made a snide comment or three, and _maybe_ his methods of retaliation were a bit cruel, and _maybe_ throwing her bag out the window after finding her kissing Vansell (ugh) in their bathroom had been a bit much.

In his defence, he wasn’t the only one with a tendency to overreact. No matter what he’d said, the soup in his lap had definitely been unnecessary.

***

He wondered why anybody had been surprised when she started running away.

Not that she’d ever gotten far. Clever though she was, very few people were willing to pick up a hitchhiker in a dirty school uniform in the dead of night, and even she couldn’t walk all the way to Glasgow (though that hadn’t stopped her from trying).

“What the hell are you even trying to do?” he’d asked one night after she’d been dragged back, disgruntled and smelling like hot garbage, by an officer who’d worn on his face the weariness of a man who’d done a job a hundred times, and knew he’d have to do it another hundred times more. “No, don’t answer that,” he’d said, cutting her off. “Seriously, what are you doing?”

She’d shrugged, looking put-together in a way he’d never have expected from someone who’d reportedly been caught chasing a fox into an alley. “The tea’s better in Darvel,” she’d said primly.

He’d stared at her. “We have an exam tomorrow,” was all he’d managed to say.

“I know.”

“And you were in Darvel.”

“Newmilns, actually,” she’d said cheerfully. “Charming couple on the road, they gave me a lift.”

“No, they didn’t.”

“Well, they were _going_ to.” She’d rolled her eyes, and Koschei had considered screaming. “But then the police caught up.”

“Fuck’s sake.” He’d felt faint.

“What?”

“You—” He’d scrubbed his hands down his face. His face had been prickly with the beginnings of stubble that she’d teased him mercilessly for (she’d pretended to sand a block of wood against his jaw at one point, and he’d hidden Ushas’s keys and told her Theta had been the one to take them. The fallout had been extraordinary). “You can’t just _walk around Scotland_.”

“Why not?” she’d asked. “I’ve been doing it, haven’t I?”

“You’re going to get expelled, at this rate,” he’d said, irritated.

“Don’t care,” she’d said.

“Yes, you do,” he snapped.

“No, I don’t.”

“Well, you should.”

“Why?”

“What are you even trying to do?” he’d asked again.

“There’s a pub in Drumclog I think you’ll like,” she’d said. “The Thursday night barman lets me in after happy hour.”

“Where would you even go?”

“The botanical gardens, I think. Or Loch Ness. We could find Nessie! Ooh, what about the Science Centre? I heard—”

“ _Theta_.”

She’d shrugged. “Does it matter?” she’d asked.

“ _Yes_ , actually.”

And, just like that, her face had shuttered and she’d stood. “No.”

The door had slammed behind her.

***

He wishes he remembered the last time he saw her better. ‘Course, he hadn’t _known_ it would be the last time. Still.

He’d never been particularly fond of Christmas, as a concept or in general. He’d liked the presents when he was younger, but even those had lost their shine as he’d gotten older. And that was to say nothing of the whole family aspect. He counts himself lucky that the endless list of uncles and aunties and cousins from his mother’s side hadn’t driven him insane.

He’d gotten into an argument with someone (Cousin? Grandparent? Family friend that wandered in for cake twenty years ago and kept showing up ever since? He didn’t remember, and he didn’t care), and gone to his room to brood (he did not, no matter what Drax said, _sulk_ ).

(It had been a spacious room, he remembered. Not the largest in the house, but far from the smallest. He hadn’t been back in years, not since his father’s funeral. He couldn’t say he missed it.)

He’d have been reading a book, probably, or something. Playing the drums, maybe, just to annoy his family, if he’d been really peeved.

He’d heard a knock at his window, and, suddenly, he’d been eight years old again. Snow had piled on his rug and he’d squinted against the blast of chill air as she clambered in.

“What are you doing here?” She’d been shaking, he remembered, and he’d chalked it up to nothing but the cold. She’d been shoeless, socks soaked through.

She’d shaken her head, dragging trembling fingers through tangled, stringy hair. She’d opened her mouth, then closed it again. “See you,” she finally managed. Her cheeks were red with cold, and her lips were tinged a blue that was almost black.

Something worth crossing the country in the middle of the night for, apparently.

He hadn’t noticed the red under her fingernails.

She hadn’t spoken for the rest of the night, something Koschei never would have thought possible before. He hadn’t asked, no matter how much he’d wanted to, and he doubted she’d have told him, anyways, even under normal circumstances. So he’d sat there, next to Theta, trembling in her cocoon of blankets and jackets. They’d fallen asleep like that, and, when he woken up, she’d been gone, along with his jumper.

It had been, in a way, he supposed one could argue, his fault. For not stopping her, for encouraging her, for being a co-conspirator, or an influence (good or bad, he didn’t know—it was up for debate), or whatever they’d deemed to call him.

“I told you that girl was no good,” his grandfather had said during breakfast, eyes on him as he shouted to the whole table. “I told you, didn’t I? Nothing good can come from someone like her, I _told_ you. Told you to drop her, didn’t I? _That girl’s no good_ , I told you, didn’t I? You remember, don’t you, I told you, _nothing good comes from hanging around_ —”

He’d nodded mutely, thumbing the corner of the newspaper with his thumb.

It hadn’t been the most flattering thing, the mugshot. At least they’d spelt her name right.

***

He’d watched him through the window. He’d looked entirely too pleased with himself, nodding in mute delight and false thanks and basking in the shower of simpering sympathy. The bandage plastered on his face had been a stark, sterile white against the muted reds and browns of the rest of him, and he’d shivered at the sight of the mottled green and purple bruising stretching out around it. _Atta girl_ , he’d almost muttered.

It had taken all of his inconsiderable self-control to not barge through the doors and finish the job for her.

(Which he had, of course. Eventually.)

It was almost a shame, he’d thought later as he’d peered over the crumbling edge of the cliff. The polish and shine of the twisted tires had gleamed under the moonlight, crushed beneath the crumpled shell of the stolen car.

He’d have liked to take off the bandage. Her handiwork deserved to be seen.

He’d dusted off his jeans, then turned and began the long walk back home.

***

He’s never been good at forgetting.


	7. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ever chucked a body out a window?” Theta asked sarcastically, scratching the back of the head. “Bet you anything someone down there screams.”
> 
> “You’re not a pedestrian.”
> 
> “You know, that might just be the nicest thing you’ve said to me lately?”
> 
> “A pedestrian, Doctor, _a_ pedestrian.”
> 
> She snickered. “Sure.”

Sometimes he wondered if he had her in his trap, or if she had him in hers. And then he’d wonder if it mattered.

***

Her truck more ground than screeched to a halt and she was thrown forwards, face colliding painfully with the steering wheel. Theta swore and pushed her glasses up onto her forehead, rubbing her nose.

A rapping sounded by her ear. She pushed the hair out of her face and squinted through the window. Jack waved, holding up a cup of what Theta prayed was coffee.

The door squealed as she threw it open and Jack made a noise of distress, nudging a scratch against the blue paint with his hip. “What have you done to her?” he asked, a look of dismay on his face.

“Been busy,” Theta grumbled, snatching the cup out of his hand. It scalded her throat as it went down and she wrinkled her nose. Decaf. Shame.

Jack huffed and took a sip from the bigger cup he’d been holding out of her reach. Bastard. “That’s neglect, Doctor,” he said, shaking his head disapprovingly. “Who do I send the complaint to?”

“Oxford.” Theta took another gulp of the barley-coffee and smacked her lips. _Two arms_ , she noted. She glanced down at his leg. “Good day?” she asked.

“It _was_.” He scowled and glanced up, the sunlight bouncing off his dark lenses. Not that many people would have need for sunglasses in mid-October, but, well, Jack. “You good for this?”

“Will be when you stop asking that.” The drink in the cup rattled as she took another sip. It wasn’t doing much to wake her up, but at least she was warm. “Lead the way, Captain.”

***

It always surprised Theta just how many people they could manage to scrounge up for a body. Nothing but contamination, in her opinion (See the scuff marks you just walked over? The eyelash that fell from your cheek when you shook your head? The dust in the carpet, the group arguing over the splatters? Yes, Johnny, even if it is just mildew). Good for her, she supposed, but also really, really bad for her. Not that she could reasonably argue too much. No stone unturned, and all that.

“Motels,” she grumbled, pressing up against the wall to let a man toting a bucket walk by (See? Contamination! She wasn’t even wearing a hairnet!) (Which wasn’t really anyone’s fault other than hers, but it wasn’t like anyone had offered her one, either). “Why’s it always a motel? Can’t anyone ever leave a body in a park, or a nice ballroom, at least?” She wrinkled her nose. “One that _doesn’t_ stink of asbestos?”

“I think that’s the air freshener, Doc,” said Jack, lifting the tape for her to slip under.

“I think I know what asbestos smells like, Jack.” He ducked after her awkwardly. She sniffed again. Blood. Lots of it. It clung to the air, the smell, giving it a weight like the lightest veil. She could almost feel it seeping into her pores.

“End of the hall.” Jack pointed around the bend. “I’ve got SOCO to clear out. Five minutes?”

She ignored the gloves a passing officer tried to hand her, tucking her spare hand into her pocket instead. “See you when I see you.”

“Five minutes,” said Jack wryly.

She winked and flounced away, pivoting around the corner.

_Ah_. She stopped dead (oh, no, bad phrasing). Well, that explained something.

She crept down the hall, tiptoeing around the splotches of blood seeped so deeply into the carpet they looked like they’d been there from the beginning. There were still puddles in some places. She wondered whether, if she stepped on a dry spot, it would crack, or simply bend.

Not just the floor, either. The walls were dripping and crusted with red, like a gruesome parody of a bad paint job, and there were even flecks on the ceiling, frozen mid-drip and dried into tiny brown stalactites.

And there, at the end of the hall, the pièce de résistance, the crowning glory, the centrepiece, the highlight. The ebony jewel in the middle of the crimson crown, and whatever passed for a gallery in a world blinded by blood.

_Wrong_ was the first word to pop into her mind. _Wrongwrongwrongwrongwrong_. Her hair was too bright, too verging on yellow, her fingers just barely too long. Chin too sharp, legs too short. Nails painted sloppily, pink polish staining the skin around the cuticles, a shirt that didn’t fit. _Wrong_.

_Imitation._

_Of ~~what?~~ ~~who?~~ ~~what?~~ ???_

Pieces of hair tucked behind ears with deft hands, rings cleaned carefully of blood before being slipped back on. Thorns woven into braids like silken ribbons, eyes that were only just too green pried out with care and locked gently between bleached white teeth, jeans cuffed neatly at the ankles. Anchors driven through flesh and bone with what you could even call tenderness.

 _This,_ she heard ~~it~~ ~~who~~ ~~her~~ _~~him~~_ him whisper, _my dear, is love_.

_A eulogy is not an epilogue_. She licked her lips. _But you wouldn’t understand that, would you?_

She lifted her hand and held it next to her face—the icy chill of death against burning human heat. Drained—no question about that. She wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d loaded it into water pistols and sprayed them willy-nilly.

No cameras, obviously. It’s what she would have done.

_She couldn’t find the door, for some reason. She couldn’t find any doors. In fact, she wasn’t even in a hall. The windows spiralled around her, and then they shattered. There was nothing behind them_.

It was in her hair, too _~~butitshouldn’thavebeen~~_ , turning flowing blonde strands into stiff brown spikes _~~ithadbeeninherhairtoo~~_.

_She was running towards the door, and then she was running along it, and then she was banging her fists against an empty wall, and then there was no wall_.

She stumbled, and heard something break.

_No walls no floors no doors and what was she standing on because it sure as hell wasn’t a sea of shattered glass so whatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwh_

_atwhatwhatwha_

She fell to her knees and the world turned white.

***

She didn’t know how long she stayed balled-up in the corner, arms tight around her legs like a vice, face buried in her knees. It could have been minutes, it could have been hours, it could even have been days—she didn’t think she would have noticed. The movements of the other people were to her like flies buzzing behind an inch of glass. She felt, rather than heard or saw, them passing in front of her, like shadows in a pitch-black room. They gave her a wide berth, inching around the invisible barrier with the care of treasure-hunters trying not to wake a sleeping dragon, or children creeping around a swollen balloon, pins held behind their backs.

Most of them already thought that she was mad (which she was—just not in the way they thought they thought she was) anyways. No harm in cementing the notion.

She felt like she’d been there for days. At the same time, she felt like she’d just sat down. When she was approached, it felt both like it was too soon and that she’d been waiting for far too long.

She’d expected Jack, or maybe Martha. She’d expected someone to crouch down next to her, to duck away from a gentle hand and leap to her feet like a coiled spring. She’d expected to plaster a smile as fake as the light in her eyes across her face and sweep out before anyone had time to ask her anything else. She’d expected to shiver and stumble her way out of the building and make the hours-long trek home down the side of the highway. Maybe she’d even have the good fortune to be murdered on her way. Or to commit one. She hadn’t decided yet.

That wasn’t what she got.

A shadow fell over her, and the hair on the back of her neck bristled. “Get up,” said Koschei. “I’m taking you home.”

Theta managed a muffled noise that could have been a groan, and a minute twitch of her head that might have been a shake. She heard Koschei sigh, and imagined his nostrils flaring in exasperation as he rolled his eyes to the heavens in search of divine guidance. “Christ’s sake,” he growled. She heard the rustle of fabric as he crouched down, and felt surprisingly gentle hands unwind her arms from around herself. She kept her eyes squeezed tightly shut as he slung one of her arms over his shoulders, and wrapped one of his own around her waist. She was just glad he didn’t try to carry her. If he would even be able to manage. She let out a faint, high-pitched giggle at the image.

“You’re not going into hysterics, are you?” Koschei asked drily. She was walking, she noted. Knees bending, bones rolling in joints. One foot in front of the other, muscles tightening and contracting and loosening and stretching. So much put into the simple action and, yet, humans did it with less effort than breathing. Neat. “Fuck. Fine.” She half-stumbled when he stopped, feet dragging against the carpet. “Hey.” He patted her shoulder. “Stairs. C’mon.”

His car was just as ridiculous as she’d expected. She thought she might have been blinded a bit by the vibrant purple (or maybe that was just her—she was still dizzy), and it had no business having that much leather inside it.

The driver’s side door slammed shut and Koschei turned the key in the ignition. The engine roared to life, and Theta felt her seat rumble beneath her. “Address,” Koschei demanded.

Theta squeezed her eyes shut. Deep blue door, paint chipped and worn from where it kept slamming into the wall. Purple couch, strewn with rainbow cushions and worn flannel blankets. Counter, stained with rings of tea and spilled soup. Bedroom. Office, books on the ground and jackets slung over the desk, and photos turned down on their faces. She shook her head and dragged her hands down her face. Where was that, again?

Koschei sighed, and Theta heard gravel crunch beneath wheels (crunchy crunch crunch). “Fine,” he said. “Alright, then. Don’t get on my case about it later, then.”

***

She didn’t remember what her dorm had looked like. Had she pinned up posters, or photos, or strung scarves and tinsel from the bedposts to the walls? What had the ceiling looked like when the curtains had shifted and let slivers of sunlight shoot through? She’d had a recorder, she remembered, and a habit of leaving it on her roommate’s dresser or her desk in the morning, and finding it on the ground in the afternoon.

Not that she’d cared. She hadn’t spent nearly enough time in that room to call it home, and wouldn’t have even gone back had she not been frog-marched every night. A place to sleep, to work, to sit in silence and contemplate whatever it was people spent their time contemplating. And dreadfully wasteful, she remembers saying. She could have done any of that just as well, if not better, on the roof, on a bench, or in Magnus’s bathtub, and given no one any reason to complain (except Mortimus, maybe, but they’d all known that he didn’t shower anyways).

At most, she thinks, it would have been a mirror of Koschei’s. His had been an impersonal one, she remembers, even in contrast to Vansell’s monotone, showroom sheets and pillows. _No point_ , he’d said, and she’d agreed and forgotten about it.

Koschei’s house wasn’t small. Normal-sized, a jogger passing by might call it. Average. _A bachelor’s pad_ would be the words on a real estate agent’s tongue, and _condo_ on the lease.

The Koschei she’d known wouldn’t have given it a second thought. The Koschei she knows tosses a throw out of the way and deposits her on an overstuffed brown armchair smelling faintly of cats.

He didn’t sit down across from her. She didn’t know whether or not she was grateful for that. “Tea?” he asked, tossing his coat over the back of the couch. “I’ve got chai, ceylon, and some weird pink stuff I got on sale.”

She cleared her throat. “Pink stuff,” she said, a bit hoarsely.

He vanished. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, resting her elbows on her knees. The chair was soft, even softer now that she was thinking about it. Soft enough that she was actually a bit worried about sinking into it. And that was _definitely_ a cat smell.

She’d had a cat once, in a sense. A stray that used to wander around the grounds sometimes that she would throw chunks of biscuit at, until Millenia told her that they were bad for cats. She’d called her (the cat, not Millenia) Stinky, Tyche, O Mighty Ball of Rage, and, on one occasion, after being scratched, Irving (she had later gone back and apologized for her actions—Theta, not the cat).

She puffed her cheeks out and let her breath out until her lungs were sagging and her chest ached. She leaned back and dragged her hands down her face.

She peeked through her fingers and let her eyes roam around the room. Walls the colour of a robin’s egg (She’d never actually _seen_ a robin before, but their eggs always looked very pretty in pictures.) (They sounded quite nice, too—the birds, not the eggs. She’d searched up a recording of their song and listened until Max from next door had banged on the wall and yelled at her to turn it off.), a coffee table covered in scratches and stains sagging under the weight of more books and magazines than she could count (she tried, then got distracted by a headline about a unicorn, Sherlock Holmes, and Jesus), heavy brown drapes she could have drowned in, and an almost-carbon copy of the rug in his office that had definitely seen better days. Faded elegance and false mosaics. About as far from his Baroquian office and tailored suits as she could imagine.

Cramped was a word. So was messy. Cozy was another.

“Tea.” She jumped. “Here.” She took the mug that was, indeed, full of steaming pink liquid. She sniffed it suspiciously.

Koschei leaned against a wall, next to an unframed painting of a desert scene. Theta felt distinctly like the tumbleweed should have been bouncing through the room, not the canvas. He shifted his own mug from one hand to the other. Theta raised her own and took a cautious sip. It tasted, to her (pleasant) surprise, more like lemons than boiled Pepto-Bismol. She took another, larger sip.

Koschei tugged idly on the string of his teabag, watching it bob up and down in his mug. “Wanna talk?” he asked.

She shrugged. “Don’t know,” she said. “Is this therapy?”

He swirled his teabag around in his cup. “This is me trying not to be an arse.” A few drops slashed over the rim, and he caught them on his finger before they fell to the ground.

“Huh.” Theta took another sip. “Needs work.”

“Yeah?” The floorboards should have creaked when he walked around her. It felt like they might have, at least. It felt like they did.

They didn’t, of course. Koschei probably wouldn’t have lived in a house with creaky floorboards even when held at gunpoint. Probably. “What happened?” he asked.

“Nothing.” She took a gulp of tea, then coughed as it scalded her throat on the way down.

“Bullshit.”

“Is that any way to talk to a patient?” she asked sardonically.

“You’re not a patient,” Koschei pointed out. “Not right now.”

Theta scowled down into her pink stuff. “Bad day,” she muttered.

“How?”

She shrugged. “Tired, I guess. Unprepared.”

“What do you mean?”

“Ever chucked a body out a window?” Theta asked sarcastically, scratching the back of the head. “Bet you anything _someone_ down there screams.”

“You’re not a pedestrian.”

“Analogy, Doctor,” Theta grumbled, dragging her hand through her hair. Her fingers caught on a knot and she tugged at it irritably. “You know, that might just be the nicest thing you’ve said to me lately?”

“A pedestrian, Doctor, _a_ pedestrian.”

She snickered. “Sure.”

“You’re tedious. A lifeless lump. I can feel myself falling asleep already.”

Theta dragged air in through her teeth. “He—there was a serial kidnapper,” she told him. “Sounds a bit silly, saying it like that, now I think about it. ‘Serial kidnapper.’ Most people don’t talk about them, you know? Not in many crime shows, I reckon. Doesn’t sound like the brightest idea, either. _Serial kidnapper_. Kidnapper, but serial. What’s one person going to do with that many people, anyways?”

She was rambling, she knew. It was the most she’d ever said at one time about it since she’d given the report, but she couldn’t seem to stop. “It wasn’t hard, in the end, to find him. Wasn’t too clever. Not clever enough, at least. You know?”

“I know,” said Koschei.

“It was a house in Leeds,” said Theta. “His house. The house wasn’t the kidnapper. That’s where he was keeping everyone. House in Leeds, on Satellite and Fifth, in the basement. Cliché, I guess, but if it ain’t broke. . .” She waited for him to cut her off. He didn’t. She took a big, harsh gulp of her tea, and coughed when it went down the wrong way.

“I didn’t—” Her fingers turned white against the mug. “It was my fault,” she said. “I know that. Jack knows that. She probably did, too.”

“Who?”

_Shit_.

Theta drained the last few drops of tea. “Doesn’t matter.”

“Obviously it does,” said Koschei sardonically.

“You know.”

“Not from you.” Was it her imagination, or was that softness in his voice? She tried to take another sip from the empty mug. “What are you afraid of?”

_Not you_ , she didn’t say. _Not myself. Not her_.

Slowly, carefully, she lowered her right hand into her lap. She turned it palm-up, shakily uncurling her fingers. “Her name was Rose,” she quietly. “She was my—” _Girlfriend_ sounded wrong; young, trivial, insouciant. _Fiancée_ hurt. _Partner_ made her want to scream. “She was my friend,” she said softly. “She was my best friend. More than that. She was everything. More than that, even. And I don’t think I ever even told her.”

“Why?”

She bared her teeth bitterly. “Because I’m an idiot,” she said, the mug hot beneath her palm. “Isn’t that what you always said?”

His fingers twitched against his knees. “What happened to him?” he asked. “The kidnapper.”

Theta shrugged. “Ran,” she said. _Ran past right in front of me and I couldn’t even get up to stop him_. “I don’t think he knew what he was doing, not really. He was half-mad to begin with. They caught up with him a day later.”

“What else?”

She closed her eyes and _bodies laid out neatly like books on a shelf metal doors swinging shut blonde hair vanishing behind cold unforgiving steel pain in her hand weight inside her heart and another one in her pocket against it_ let her breath out through her nose.

“She looked like her,” she said. “That girl. On the wall. She looked like Rose.”

“Do you ever think about revenge?” The question burst forwards abruptly, like water from a split balloon.

She frowned. “Where’s that coming from?”

“It’s a question,” said Koschei, eyes never moving from hers. “Do you?”

Theta tapped her fingers on the rim of her mug. “No point,” she muttered. “Just causes more trouble.”

“That’s changed,” Koschei muttered.

“Be bad if it hadn’t, though, wouldn’t it?” Theta put the empty mug down on the coffee table, then instantly regretted it. She settled for picking at her fingernails instead. “I think that’s what people call growth.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“Too bad. It’s all I’ve got.”

“Hypothetically?”

She prodded at a hangnail, and imagined peeling it away. She could see it in her mind, clear as day: the thinnest strip of skin hanging from her hand like a loose thread and a trail of red in its wake. “I hear pushing them off cliffs works great.”

“Yeah?” he said almost before she’d finished speaking.

“No.” She pried at the tip of one nail with another. “It’s shit, by the way. The cliff thing.”

He shrugged. “Same goes for most split-second decisions, I’d wager.”

“Split-second.” He shrugged again.

“I’d assume.” He moved around her, and she shifted back in her chair as he bent over the coffee table. He swept a newspaper from last month and a magazine headlining an article about a man with twelve fingers out of the way and sat down in front of her. “You still haven’t said.” He put his mug down next to himself.

She watched it teeter precariously on the stack of magazines, pinching the tip of her finger until it turned red. “Does it matter?”

“Will you tell me if I say yes?”

She huffed. “I don’t think you’re supposed to say that.”

“Oh, go on, Theta.”

She shrugged. “Kill him, I suppose.”

“You suppose?”

“It’s not like I’ve thought about it.” Not actively, at least.

“How?”

She dragged a breath in through her teeth. “I don’t know,” she said.

“But you would.”

“I would.”

He cocked his head. “That doesn’t bother you?”

“Why would it?”

He shrugged. “Ethics?” he suggested. “Moral code? You’ve got one, haven’t you?”

“You know, sometimes it sounds like you’re one bad day away from being Harold Shipman.”

He snorted. “Well?”

Theta pressed her finger against her palm. The _crack_ echoed through the room. “Hannah,” she said, “said it’s alright. That it’s cathartic.”

“Hannah?” Koschei asked sharply.

“Yup.” Theta popped the knuckle on her next finger. “She’s a therapist. Maybe you’ve met?”

“I thought you didn’t see anyone,” said Koschei, sounding very much like he’d just been tricked and wasn’t too happy about it.

“I didn’t.” Theta cracked her pinkie. “Ianto tricked me into picking Jack up. She was very nice to talk to.”

“Yeah?”

“‘Course. Lovely woman. Like cats. Your chair smells like one, you know?”

“A woman?”

“A _cat_.”

“Mhm. Would you like me to arrange the funeral now, or later?”

She kicked at his shin, and he stomped on her toes. Theta’s scowl deepened, and Koschei just managed to yank his leg out of the way in time. Theta flopped back in her seat and glared at him.

Koschei leaned back on his arms. His eyes followed the faint shaking of her right hand. “Would you?” he asked softly. And then, “I would.”

_Did_.

Theta looked down, letting her hair fall over her face. “They thought it was me,” she said suddenly. Her nail throbbed where she’d tugged at it. “They thought it was me that—you know. Glospin.” The name felt foreign on her tongue, misshapen in her mouth. “Somehow.” She dug her nails into the back of her hand until her fingers shook.

He reached forwards and stilled her hands with his. They were warm, feverish, almost, against the cold of her fingers. “Did you ever read my letters?” he asked. “I thought—” He took in a deep, rattling breath, then let out one that sounded like a laugh. “I don’t know. No one else ever said anything about it to me, but I thought that the others were writing you, too.” His hands tightened around hers. “Did you even open them?” he asked, sounding very much like he already knew the answer.

She tried to clench her fists, and he tightened his fingers around hers. “Wasn’t exactly high on my list of priorities,” she muttered.

“What was?”

“Believe it or not, Koschei, you’re not the centre of the universe,” she bit out. “Or mine, either.”

He didn’t let go of her hands, and she didn’t pull them back, either. He toyed with the tip of her pinky—the crooked one, from when she’d broken it punching a cabinet when they were twelve. “Why?” he asked again.

She looked down at their hands. His were fine-boned and calloused, the skin around his nails darkened and bruised. Hers were smaller, but rougher, the dirt under her nails a stark contrast to his careful manicure, and shaking like leaves in the wind.

What a pair they made.

“You’d want to talk,” she said. “You’d want to talk about it.”

His fingers wrapped around her wrist, twining like leaves of grass reclaiming what was theirs. Serpents drawn to the light, closer and closer until the toothy jaws could snap shut over them. “Sounds like the pot calling the kettle black to me,” said Koschei. “You’re the talker. Always yammering.”

She rolled her eyes. “You wouldn’t have let it go,” she said. “You know you do that, right? Grab onto something and just hang on?”

He rolled his eyes. “Pot,” he said, holding up their hands, “meet kettle.”

She snorted, and tugged her hands back.

He let it go. For now.

***

It hadn’t been a gift. Not to her.

He wasn’t an idiot; he knew that.

Still.

Still.

It had been something.

He tugged the oven door open, and a wall of heat hit him in the face. He grimaced and squinted through the wavering haze.

She’d never been good at taking care of herself. He’d bring her something tomorrow.


	8. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bullshit. Bullshit smeared across a server and tagged as news. She scoffed and dragged her fingers over her scalp. A strand of hair got caught beneath a nail and she shuddered as she tugged it free.
> 
> Abruptly, she threw herself to the ground, then got up again, then sat back down.

_Thump. Thump. Thump_.

Theta missed the ball on the last bounce. She twisted around to watch as it went over her shoulder and into the corner. She stared at it for a moment then sighed and got to her feet.

She brushed the dust clinging to the rubber surface off and wrinkled her nose. It was something new to look at, at least.

She glanced over her shoulder. The empty whiteboard stared accusingly back at her.

Well. Almost empty.

She flung the ball at it again. It knocked off a magnet before bouncing off in the other direction. A photograph fluttered loose and slid across the floor, finally coming to a stop under the toe of Theta’s boot.

Annie Hopkins. That had been her name, the girl on the wall. Her mother had confirmed it.

She grimaced as she crouched to pick it up, and shuddered when her nails scraped against the plasticky surface of the photo paper.

She tossed the picture onto her desk and snatched up a scrap sheet of paper (at least, she hoped it was scrap). She wandered around the desk in a circle, tilting her head up to stare at the ceiling.

Had it taken her this long, before, to figure things out?

She threw herself into her seat. It jolted and she kicked the desk, sending herself spinning across the room. Her elbow slammed into the wall with a _bang_ and she winced. The chair squeaked in protest.

No, it hadn’t. At least, she didn’t think so. It was hard to remember. Hard to put into perspective, at least. Time was fickle like that.

She balled up the paper in her hands and tossed it between her hands. _Everyone has off days_ , she reasoned. _Nothing to be ashamed of_. She clenched the ball tighter in her hands and kicked off the wall, spinning back towards her desk.

She grabbed it with her free hand as she passed, dragging herself to a stop.

Off days. That’s what this was, then. An off day. Off month. Months, if you would (she wouldn’t).

Of course, most peoples’ off days didn’t involve giving funeral homes more business.

She tossed her rudimentary ball at the board. It more flopped than bounced off, crinkling as it drifted to the ground. She sighed and tossed her feet onto her desk.

It _hadn’t_ taken her this long before. That, she was certain of.

So why the _hell_ was it taking her this long now?

She could hardly be out of practice. That just wasn’t something that happened. Not like this, not with her. She scowled and snatched the marker pen off the table, twisting its cap on and snapping it back on again. _Pop, click, pop, click, squeak, click, pop_.

She bit down on the end of the cap and twirled the pen between her fingers. There was, she admitted to herself with a small grimace, always the possibility of the copycat being better than her. Small, though. Very small. Miniscule, even, if you liked the word, which she did. Not one that she was willing to entertain, though.

He wasn’t. Not the type.

It was stifling. She tugged her jacket off and tossed it to the side of the room.

_Motive_. There was always motive. Even when the motive was nothing, there was always a _reason_. She knew that better than anyone.

Chewing gum too loud. Unfortunate resemblance to an old enemy. Stupid hair.

Convenience.

Who, her? Projecting? Pshaw.

It could, suggested a small, traitorous voice at the corner of her mind sounding suspiciously like a certain bearded psychiatrist, be that, though, couldn’t it? _Maybe_ , it suggested. _Maybe. Just maybe. Maybe you’re sympathetic? Empathetic, even? Could that be possible? Maybe you don’t_ want _to catch him. Maybe you’re on his side, just a bit, or maybe you’re worried about what comes next, or that_ —  
She threw the marker at the board. It left a streak of black in its wake and rolled away to join the ball.

What _had_ she done before?

The subconscious was a funny thing.

She slid off her seat and flopped to the ground. She quinted up at the ceiling, a frown tugging at her eyebrows.

She’d talked to people, she was fairly sure. Nothing door-to-door, but she had. Watched interrogations from behind the glass. Joined in, sometimes ( _very_ sometimes) (as in once).

She grimaced and pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes until she felt like they were going to burst.

Not mainly, though. Nothing as inactive as that.

No.

It must have been her second year, or maybe late in her first. Before her third, for sure. Between August and November, maybe?

Disembowelment. That, she remembered. Disembowelment. Disembowelment and bone-robbing, which hadn’t been a term before that day, and for good reason, too.

A doctor, John had said. A surgeon, Mike had corrected. A fucking sicko, Owen had grumbled. That doesn’t help, Jack had snapped.

(And _that’s the thing_ : how do you know? How do they—how does _she_ —fit so perfectly into the mold, this archetype, this machine, and how do they make it work?

And here’s the other thing: it doesn’t always have to be that complicated.)

Anyone who’s ever cooked a chicken can figure out how to break out a spine. Anyone with half a brain can figure out how to use a knife. But who’s going to need that many bones?

Ah. There’s the question.

It wasn’t the sort of question to be answered in an office, or at home, or in front of a board. It wasn’t the sort of question to be answered, period.

(The term ‘liquid courage’ truly wasn’t any sort of exaggeration. It had burned going down, and had burned coming up again the next morning, but, in the moment, head spinning, blood rushing, heart beating like the drums of war, she’d felt weightless, and weightless she’d stayed.)

_The femur_ , she’d remembered, somewhat hazily, hands buried in dying, withered heat. The tear of skin and a crack like splitting wood—

Wood.

There’s the answer.

(The chairs really hadn’t been too comfortable, though she supposed they fit a certain aesthetic. Theta had left it to Jack to suggest burying the furniture to the families.)

Her phone rang and she all but dove for it, sending papers flying. “She’s a bitch,” said Martha before it had even finished ringing.

“What?”

She heard a shuffling on the other end of the line. Her phone buzzed against her ear. “Messages,” said Martha bitterly.

Theta flicked the call to speaker and dropped the phone on the desk, leaning over it and squinting down at the screen.

Her stomach turned.

“Just a gossip column, but Jack’s losing it,” Martha informed her. Her voice sounded oddly thin over the speakers, like she was whispering into a tin can. Or was that just her?

Theta waited for her to say something else. “Did you read it?” she asked when she didn’t.

“No.” Lie. Theta pursed her lips and flicked her finger up the screen. The words whipped by in a blur of black on shocking pink, like ants smudged across a page. What she did catch made her nauseous. “Any luck, it’ll be down soon.”

“Won’t be,” Theta grumbled, grimacing and pinching the bridge of her nose. Her head was pounding. “Free press.”

Martha made a concerting noise over the line. “Ask Jake to hack it?” she suggested.

Theta shook her head, then remembered that Martha couldn’t see her. “Nah,” she said lightly. “Nah,” she repeated. Her tongue felt like sandpaper.

“Fine.” Martha didn’t sound upset, Theta didn’t think. And then she wondered why she thought she would be. “You alright?”

“Hm.” Her fingertips were tingling, buzzing with something that wasn’t quite warmth, but couldn’t reasonably be called anything else, either. “Yeah,” she forced herself to say, biting out a tight grin, despite the fact that Martha couldn’t see her. “Yep. Right.”

She hung up and threw her phone across the desk. Her hands shook when she flexed them, palms stinging with pins and needles.

_Fuck._

***

Really, Theta didn’t know why she was so surprised. After all, it had only been a matter of time.

Cases dragged on. It happened. It wasn’t like there was much they could do about it. Asking nicely never seemed to help.

(Theta had been asked to give an interview, once. It had gone horribly, and she was fairly certain that, had the microphone not been mysteriously unplugged, it would have been a disaster.)

She drummed her fist against the table, staring at her screen. The computer had switched itself off ages ago, but she didn’t need to see the article to quote it.

_Scandalous_ , the writer (Claire Rook, her name had been Claire Rook. Like a side character in a children’s adventure novel.) had said. Well, if you were looking for it, maybe.

She squeezed her eyes shut and dragged her hands down her face, elbows grinding against the desk.

It didn’t matter. It shouldn’t. They’d all been dragged by the press at some point or another (Some more than others; Martha had a Google Alert set up for Jack, and Mickey had taken out subscriptions to at least three tabloids. He didn’t seem to mind—rather, he seemed to thrive on the attention).

It was a _gossip rag_. A gossip rag that had clearly stolen pictures from _The Guardian_. They were running hentai ads alongside the front page, for God’s sake.

A gossip rag that had gotten ahold of her school records _what the fuck_.

She hit the space bar and the screen blinked back to life.

913 hits, because this was the kind of website that counted hits. One each for Jack, Martha, and Mickey, and another nine for her. 901, then.

She leaned back in her seat, squeezing her eyes shut.

_Troubled past_. She scoffed. The whole thing was one badly-Photoshopped cover from being a supermarket pulp novel.

_I’m not angry._

_What word would you prefer?_

She opened her eyes a crack and peered at the screen.

915\. Fuck her.

She could, she supposed, call Koschei, if only to let him know.

Koschei.

Koschei, who had been in the article too.

 _There is reason to call into question the ethics of the investigation, especially when considering the presence of famed psychiatrist Koschei Oakdown in the lives of the senior investigators_ —

 _Famed_. She scoffed. She could almost see Koschei’s head swelling. Hardly the word she’d use. _Inobscure_ , maybe.

 _—a hidden past shared with the notorious Theta Lungbarrow herself_ —

She gagged and slammed the laptop shut.

Her legs were itching. She leapt to her feet and began pacing.

Bullshit. Bullshit smeared across a server and tagged as news. She scoffed and dragged her fingers over her scalp. A strand of hair got caught beneath a nail and she shuddered as she tugged it free.

Abruptly, she threw herself to the ground, then got up again, then sat back down.

_The infamous raid on Satellite and Fifth—_

There was hair on the carpet, too, and eraser shavings, and a bit of a broken branch she’d tracked in on her boots. She twisted it beneath her fingers until it snapped, then did it again, and again.

_—in the perfect true crime setup, with Lungbarrow set to lead; but as the villain, or the hero?_

She snorted, brushing her hands clean on her knees. It was almost—no, it _was_ —laughable.

Her keys were still in her pocket. She supposed she’d forgotten to take them out.

She dragged her fingers through her hair again. Her scalp was oily; she hadn’t showered.

She jiggled her leg, heel beating the ground.

It’s the moments in between, Rose used to believe, that are the most important. Nothing planned _really_ happens, she used to tell her. It’s the stuff before and after that decides everything.

Failure drives success. Grief drives rage.

She vaulted to her feet and marched out the door.


	9. all you have to do is breathe. but you could never do that right either, could you?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She relishes the dig of hard edges into her hand as she balls each letter up and drops them in the bin.

_“Glospin?”_

_“Theta. How nice of you to join us.”_

_“Why’re the lights off, what’re you—”_

_“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, cousin dear.”_

_“Glospin, what—oh.”_

_“Back away, Theta.”_

_“Glospin, what did you—”_

“Ow!”

_“Glospin!”_

_“You’ve stabbed me! You stabbed me!”_

_“What the hell are you doing? Get up, he—_ shit _.”_

 _“_ Help! _Somebody, help!”_

_“Stop it!”_

_“What’s going on?”_

_“Oh, my god.”_

_“She stabbed me! She killed him, and she stabbed—”_

_“I didn’t do this, I just found—”_

_“_ Fuck _, I can’t feel my fingers—oh, god, I’m faint—”_

_“Shut up!”_

_“Get her away from me!”_

_“Quences, he—”_

_“It was him—”_

_“I can’t—”_

_“_ I didn’t do this _!”_

_“Stop it!”_

_“Get her off_ —fuck _!”_

_“What the hell’ve you done?!”_

***

“Hello, Theta.” She glances up at the new man.

“Hello. I like your waistcoat.”

The doctor smooths the wrinkles in it as he sits, placing his notebook on his knee. “Thank you.”

“They won’t let me have a waistcoat,” she says. Her chin is in her hand, elbow propped up on the armrest. It’s an expensive chair—it feels like one, at any rate—and she’s half-afraid her arm will sink into the leather. “Or a suit, for that matter. I’ve asked for one, asked them to bring me one from home, but they keep saying no. Why do you suppose that is?”

“When you say they, are you referring to your family?”

“Lovely weather, isn’t it?” she says, cocking her head in her hand. It’s pouring buckets, and the window panes rattle with every fat droplet.

“I suppose it is,” says the doctor, “if you like the downpour.”

“Rain’s nice,” she says. “Rain’s brilliant.”

He chuckles. “No shortage of that in Cardiff.”

“Love a good rainstorm,” she says. “And there’s always the best puddles afterwards. Mud, too. Love mud. Bad rep.” She frowns. “Too bad.” She glances at him out of the corner of her eye. There’s something written at the top of the page, but she can’t make out what it is. Shorter than a note, longer than the date. “Are you going to tell me that that’s a metaphor?”

“Do you see it as a metaphor?”

She shrugs. “Don’t know. Sounds like something you’re supposed to say.” She drops her arm and rolls her head back, staring up at the ceiling. “Why’s it always got to be a metaphor? Can’t anything just be what it is? Though,” she says, tilting her head from side-to-side, letting it roll across the back of the might-be-be-expensive chair, “I guess things wouldn’t be as interesting, then.” She glances up. The doctor is looking at her, a look of amusement writ across his face. “Sorry, were you talking? Carry on.”

“I didn’t say anything,” he says, still smiling. It’s a bit condescending, that smile, like he’s talking to a child. She wants to smack him.

“You’re supposed to. Maybe. I don’t do this often.”

“These sessions are for us to speak to each other, and for you to help me understand.”

“Understand.”

“You. Your issues.”

“Ah, of course.” She grins. She’s sure it doesn’t reach her eyes. “My _issues_.”

“You don’t think you have any?”

“Oh, no, I have plenty.”

“Which are?”

“I’m delusional, I suppose,” she says. “Mad? I’m afraid I don’t know the terms. I mauled my cousin, and I’ve been told by various—” she picks at a loose string on the pocket of her jeans, “— _irrefutable sources_ that I stabbed him and killed my great-uncle, too.”

“You don’t believe it.”

“Oh, no.” She smiles pleasantly. “I’m a pacifist, you see.”

“Oh?”

Theta makes a face and leans over the armrest. “Nice courtyard,” she says, peering out the window. “Bit bland, but nice. Cobblestone, very daring, especially in this economy. Are we allowed outside? I think some fresh air would be nice, don’t you? Very good for—” she mimes a deep breath, then twirls her finger beside her head. “You know, clearing the head?” The doctor opens his mouth and she cranes her neck a bit further. “Lovely flowers,” she says. “What are those, daisies? Chrysanthemums? _Dianthus caryophyllus_?”

“. . . Dandelions.”

All in all, it’s a fantastic waste of time.

***

The thing about time, see, is that it passes. Obviously.

It’s not something she normally has the time (ha) to dwell on. Better things, yeah?

The thing about being shoved into a box is that she fancies she can feel each and every individual second scraping by. It’s grating, the boredom, and she thinks that, if she hadn’t been mad before, she certainly is now.

She’s finished all the books by the second week. She’s exhausted all scenarios of revenge by the third. She’s had two lamps, a chair, and her curtains confiscated by the fourth, and cutlery privileges revoked three days later.

She bursts into hysterical giggles when they come back and search her bedframe and even the pack of cards she hasn’t touched, and gets sedated for her effort.

It’s the first time she’s laughed since Christmas.

***

“Still no Black Sabbath?” asks Manny-with-the-hair.

“Nope.” She grins up at him, strumming a G.

He shakes his head, and his hair flops around his shoulders. It’s a fascinating thing to see from upside-down. “Shameful,” he tuts. “What’s this, then?”

She plucks a D. “Brahms.”

He watches her swallow her medication, and she waves him off with a grin. She spits out the pill the second the door shuts, wrinkling her nose as she wipes her tongue on the back of her sleeve.

She unwinds the axe that night, and cuts through the paint on her window with the tip of the D string. She picks the lock with E and B, and swings to the ground with the help of her bedclothes and G. She leaves the body on her bed with a smiley face drawn in black marker below the bridge.

She doesn’t get far. But that’s not the point.

***

“You’ve escaped twice this past month, Theta.”

“I’ve been caught twice,” she corrects. “On an unrelated note, I’m playing at a pub in Riverside next Thursday, so don’t be too disappointed when I don’t show up for our appointment.”

He gives her an admonishing look. “Theta.”

“You’re right, you’re right,” she sighs. “I lied. It’s on Tuesday. Hey, you should stop by!”

“You haven’t been speaking with any other patients.”

“You’re not going to tell me that I’m antisocial, are you?”

“That’s exactly what I’m telling you, Theta.” He leans forward. “It’s not good, to isolate yourself.”

“It’s not good for me to be locked up,” she counters, “but you still do it anyway.”

He ignores her. “You’ve only got one person on your visitor’s list. Isn’t there anyone else you’d like to add?”

She shrugs. There’s a ragged part of the armrest where she’s been putting her elbow, and she picks at the cracking leather with her nail. “Not that I can think of.”

“The number of people you keep denying says otherwise.” She ignores him. She slides lower in her seat and glances out the window. It’s sunny, ridiculously so, and the light bounces off the window and back into her eyes, making her wince.

She rubs the edge of her jumper between her thumb and forefinger. The wool is worn and growing threadbare. “Don’t wanna see.”

He tilts his head. She sees him ready his pen. “They don’t want to see you? Or you don’t want to see them?”

“Bit socially awkward, me,” she says over him, twisting a loose curl of purple yarn around her finger. “Wouldn’t know what to say. Not much to talk about. I think I’d just—” She waves her hand. “Make a weird noise and drift off. No point in them making the trip for that.”

“That’s just an excuse, Theta, and I think you and I both know it.”

“Excuses are just reasons you don’t like.” She shrugs. “Anyways.”

“Yes?” She shrugs again. He switches tactics. “Tell me about your family.”

She raises an eyebrow. “I thought you were supposed to be subtle.”

“You don’t respond to subtlety,” he says frankly.

“Eh.”

“You don’t get on with them.”

“Gold star!” she proclaims. “That doctorate is well-earned, I see.”

“Your relationships are strained. How did that happen?” Silence. He tries again. “What sets you apart from them, Theta?”

She groans. “My grandfather made his fortune digging up rocks,” she says. “My brother made his carving them into octopi with boobs. My father wasted his on his woes and exotic cheese. Meanwhile, I live in a loony bin and have no money. Happy?”

“Not particularly.”

“Hm. Shame.”

***

She spreads the envelopes out in front of her like a puzzle. The edges and corners slot together, just, and she runs her fingers over the gaps in her mosaic of correspondence. The paper is rough, just enough to bump and drag against her skin, and she runs her fingertips along the scalloped edges of the stamps.

There’s quite a number of them—not as much as she’d thought, but still more than she’d expected. She sees a magazine she doesn’t remember taking out a subscription for, and a handful of letters addressed in a familiar cramped scrawl.

She relishes the dig of hard edges into her hand as she balls each one of them up and drops them in the bin.

***

“You can’t keep doing this, Theta.”

“I’m insane,” she says with a smile that was all teeth and no warmth. “I can do what I want.”

“You’re not, and you know it.”

Brax looks conspicuously out-of-place, washed-out and sickly, beneath the dingy fluorescent lighting. The maroon of his suit stands out like a sore thumb against the stained yellow of his seat.

Theta nudges a pawn forwards. “Really? I don’t know, everyone else seems pretty insistent on it.”

Brax barely spares the board a glance as he picks up his knight. He taps the base of the plastic piece against each square, and Theta scowls. “It’s this or prison, and—”

“Oh, I’m so sorry.” She scowls, slamming another pawn down. Brax glances down his nose at it, and shifts it closer to the centre of the square. “My sincerest apologies. How selfish of me to forget about your reputation when there’s a _murderer walking free_.”

He captures her queen and places it on his side of the rickety table, lining it up with her other fallen pieces. She glares at the board for a moment, then moves a piece at random. Brax lets out a long-suffering sigh that makes her want to punch him, and corrects its course. “This is a situation, Theta, and, as usual, you’ve done nothing to help alleviate it.”

“Far be it for your best speeches to be wasted in a hospital sitting room.” She sinks lower into her seat and stretches out her legs. Her scuffed trainers bump against the polished toes of his shoes and he shoots her a look promising nothing short of bloody vengeance before moving them out of the way.

“Petulance won’t help you.”

“Oh, no,” she says monotonously. “My great plan has been foiled.”

“They’ve told me that you’ve been escaping.”

“It’s not that hard, after the first few times,” she says. She kicks the seat of his chair. _Thump thump thump_. His eye twitches. “You should try it sometime. I’m sure you’d look lovely in a straightjacket.”

“Theta.” She throws her hands into the air.

“I’m going mad, _Irving_ ,” she spits, “madder than usual, and this is _not_ my fault! Fuck’s sake, I didn’t kill him!”

“I’d stop shouting, if I were you,” he says drily. There’s a nurse glaring at her from the corner, and she makes sure she sees her stick her tongue out at her before turning back to her brother.

Brax shifts a bishop forwards. Theta stares at it, then reluctantly moves a pawn into the empty space. The sleeves of the stolen jumper are just a bit too long and loose, covering her hands, and the dangling ends knock a piece over. Brax straightens it. “How are the elections?” she asks. He ignores her, and captures the pawn. “Oh, am I not allowed to ask? Or are those over? It’s just _so hard_ to keep track of things in here.”

“Theta.”

She cocks her head. “What about the funeral?” He glowers at her.

“Which one?”

She raises an eyebrow. “Pardon?”

He lets out a hiss of annoyance. “Haven’t you read a _single_ letter?”

She lets out a long, drawn-out sigh. “It’s just _so hard_ , you know?” she says. “To hear about things and know I won’t be able to take part?” She flutters her eyelashes. He looks nauseous. “Solitary confinement’s considered a form of torture, you know.”

“Glospin’s dead.”

She blinks slowly. Then again. When she opens her eyes for the third time, she’s still watching him. She leans forward and captures a rook. His eyes flick down to the board for a fraction of a second, then back again. “My condolences,” she says slowly.

“And mine.” He sounds almost bitter.

“Open casket?” she asks innocently.

She thinks he might have cracked his bishop. “Cremation,” he says with a glare.

“Conservative.” She nods. “Nice. Were there cocktails at the reception?”

He slams his knight into check and stands, straightening his suit. “Koschei Oakdown wants to be put on your visitor’s list,” he says shortly, doing up the buttons of his jacket. “I’ve denied it for you.”

She twists the corner of the jumper. “Thanks.”

“Lovely seeing you. Don’t get well soon. And read the letters, will you?” He slings his coat over his shoulder and then he’s gone, the door slowly swinging shut behind him. Not quite as dramatic as she thinks he was aiming for, but they’re not allowed to have slamming doors.

Her captured pieces are neatly lined up across from her like an army of ghosts, the remaining ones pinpricks across a board dominated by black. Her handful of hostages are scattered across the table, sad and pitiful in comparison.

She grabs her king and hurls it to the ground.

The floor is carpeted. It lands without a sound.


	10. Chapter Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He moved in a way that reminded Theta both of a predator stalking its prey, and a shadow slinking against the wall, hiding from the light, every action measured and deliberate. His face was carefully blank, eyes fixed on the body.
> 
> “Fuel for your fire?” he asked, stopping next to her.
> 
> “Kindling,” Theta replied.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heed the warnings!

It was almost insultingly easy to track Claire Rook down. Theta would have thought that someone who made a living dragging other peoples’ names through the mud would be more careful. Journalists had to have enemies, right?

Or maybe she was just lucky.

The floors of the hallways were carpeted in a muddy red swirl that made Theta recoil, and there was a smell like sour milk, or an old litterbox, clinging to the ugly yellow plaster. There were no cameras—none that had posed a challenge, at least—and the lock on the woman’s door popped open after barely a second. Theta pushed it open and slipped into the flat, silent and unobtrusive as a shadow.

Rook herself was sprawled over the counter, eyes closed, mouth agape, a thin line of drool running down her cheek and onto the scattered papers she was snoring atop. A pen dangled loosely from her right hand, and a printer beeping away happily near her left. Her laptop was still open, and an indecipherable scribble stretched into a steep line on the notepad in front of her. A tall grey mug sat next to her head, three soggy teabags sitting at the bottom of it. It was cold.

Theta slid one of the pages out from under her. Her own face stared back, thinner and gaunter, eyes heavy with shadows. It didn’t take a genius to figure out when it had been taken. Her hair was a brown, tangled mat hanging to the base of her ribs, and her lips thinned at the sight of the familiar pink jacket she was wrapped in.

She sifted through the other pages. Notes and articles, and even a few of her published papers, stretching back years, dragged out from where they’d been hiding behind various curtains of obscurity. A little square clipped out of an old newspaper about her father’s wedding, an old school photo she forbade herself from lingering on, a front-page article about Satellite and Fifth and another about the trial—

And, for a moment, she was tempted, so tempted, to tear the pages to shreds, to light them on fire and use Rook as the kindling.

She dropped the stack, lip curling in disgust. She supposed that if there was one thing she could respect the other woman for, it was her dedication.

The pages scattered themselves across the kitchen, fluttering down to the floor and counter. One settled lightly on Rook’s face, and Theta brushed it off. She twitched in her sleep, and let out a small grunt.

There was a tea towel hanging from a cupboard door. Theta slipped it off and wound it into a ball. She glanced around, and her gaze lingered for a moment on the knife rack. She dragged gloved fingertips over the brightly-coloured handles, and glanced back at Rook. There was a frown on her face, and she shifted slightly, fingers twitching.

Theta scowled and, with no further hesitation, grabbed Rook by the hair and shoved the towel into her mouth. Rook’s eyes flew open and she let out a muffled scream, hands flying up to grab at the hand in her hair, to claw at Theta, to bat her away. She grabbed onto the collar of Theta’s shirt and Theta shoved her, sending both women to the floor in a tangle of limbs and fists.

Rook twisted and thrashed beneath Theta like a fish flopping about on a dock, and Theta pressed a knee into the small of her back, pinning her to the floor. “Quiet,” Theta snarled in her ear, and Rook reared her head back.

Theta let out a hiss through gritted teeth when she felt Rook’s skull collide with her face, but didn’t loosen her hold. Rook moved as if to try again, and Theta grabbed her shoulder and wrenched her arm up.

Rook made a thin, high-pitched noise through the impromptu gag, and jabbed up at Theta with her other shoulder, twisting like a pretzel in a way that had to be painful. Theta grabbed her on either side of the head and slammed her face into the hard tile floor one, two, three, four, five times—

(And she remembered why now, remembered why she did it, why she’d done it, why she was doing it. She remembered why she kept coming back, even when she kicked and screamed in the middle of the night and couldn’t stop herself from heaving at the sight of anyone resembling any of them in the slightest. Because this was the moment, when there were no doors swinging and screaming in the forefront of her mind, when her actions didn’t wait, and when she was more than just a passenger in her own body. When one wrong was put right by another, and her fear was more than just a shackle.

It was a bit like running, except, with running, she could always stop.)

Theta dropped Rook and stumbled to her feet, backing away from the spreading pool of blood. Still, she got a few drops on the tips of her boots, and she grimaced down at them.

Rook was still, lying face-down, one arm limp beside her, the other jerked upwards at an awkward angle that hurt to look at. Theta tore her eyes away, and set to work.

The door was easy enough. There was a hammer beneath the sink, and Theta was able to knock the latch out and the hinges loose with a few swift blows. The kitchen, too, was summarily dismantled—barstools knocked over, glasses shattered, smears of blood wiped against the counter. Theta swept the laptop off the counter and watched its screen shatter against the floor with something akin to vindication in her smile. It looked everything like an everyday crime of passion.

(Which it was, in a sense—but passion wasn’t always mindless.)

Now, the hard part.

It never failed to amaze Theta just how _heavy_ bodies could be. Claire Rook had been thin, and delicate like a figure of glass, but, still, Theta was panting by the time she’d gotten her to the balcony door. Whoever had said that the human body lost weight after death had clearly never had to drag a corpse across the room. (Oh, so _that’s_ where “dead weight” came from.)

She dragged the screen door open, one arm still wrapped around Rook like a massive, unwieldy teddy bear, and the night air hit her in the face. She wrinkled her nose. The air in the city was heavy in a way it wasn’t in other places, like they were living in a massive glass bell jar, thick with the smell of petrol fumes and cigarette smoke, sticky with clouds of leftover fryer oil, and clinging with the sour stench of alleyways. Rousing in its own right, to be sure, but stifling in so many more.

She leaned the body against the railing and, with a heave, shoved it over. She heard a _whap_ and crinkle of plastic as it hit the sheet she had spread out over the dumpster below.

She didn’t bother closing the balcony door, and made sure to stomp through the blood as she crossed the room. She marched down the hallway, back the way she came, leaving the door ajar behind her and crimson footprints in her wake.

***

She couldn’t bring Rook home. That much was certain.

She just wished that she’d thought of that _before_ she’d dragged her from the dumpster and bundled her in the backseat of her car.

She groaned, and thumped her head against the steering wheel (though she carefully avoided the horn). Her muscles were aching, and she didn’t have any shoes (the oversized, bloodied boots had gone into the dumpster, underneath a leaking trash bag, and what had looked like last week’s turkey)—she couldn’t very well carry her all the way back there. Besides, there was the matter of DNA traces.

The woods? No; too distinguished, and she couldn’t very well be caught investigating herself. She toyed with the idea of the landfill by the river, but dismissed the idea just as quickly.

She glanced into the rearview mirror. Rook stared back with judgement in her cold, dead eyes.

“You’re loving this, aren’t you?” Theta grumbled.

The body, thankfully, did not respond.

***

She remembered the way vaguely enough that she only got lost twice. In her defence, the streets had an annoying habit of all looking the same at night.

There was something comforting about the house in the dark, and the way it loomed from the shadows, more a shape in the night and less a hidden aberration beneath the sun. Like voices falling perfectly into synch or a monster that didn’t have to hide anymore. Reflective of its inhabitant, Theta supposed.

Likewise, there was a semblance of casual contentment to be found in the image of the corpse laid out across the dining table. An acknowledgement of an action done. A token given away that could not be taken back. Like a painting, in the sense of horror and impossibility hidden beneath a veneer of simplicity. _She is here, she is dead, and whatever else led up to that_.

And Theta waited.

She wasn’t used to waiting. It was normally other people waiting for her, or her running off and finding something to entertain herself with in the time where she was supposed to be waiting. She could hardly be blamed for that. After all, where was the fun—or point—in waiting? Standing around and twiddling your thumbs for an hour in anticipation of another task that would lead to more waiting, that would lead to another task and more waiting, and on and on and on. Tick-tock tick-tock goes the clock.

 _Time_. Always running out, she was.

She heard the low rumble of an engine in the driveway and straightened, clasping her hands behind her back. She heard the buzz of the lock on the front door, and footsteps in the hallway.

Koschei opened the door, and stopped dead at the sight before him.

“Hey,” said Theta.

Koschei closed the door slowly behind him. “Theta,” he said.

Theta opened her mouth, but no words came out. It was a funny feeling, being lost for words—normally, she’d only need the slightest prompt to let loose a stream of chatter, opinions, and fun facts. Being speechless was frustrating, and sparked panic in a way not unlike being caught at the business end of a loaded gun. Words were here weapons, her defense, and, right now, she had none.

_I was angry_ , she could have said. _I had every right. She was the one at fault. I’ve done so much penance, I deserve a slip. She wrote about me. She wrote about you. It’s just this once_. The explanations—excuses—bounced around in her head like balls on a pool table, crashing against each other and spinning around, slipping away and never quite missing the mark all at the same time.

“Her flat was a mess,” said Theta.

Koschei hung his overcoat over the back of a chair and moved around the table to join her. He moved in a way that reminded Theta both of a predator stalking its prey, and a shadow slinking against the wall, hiding from the light, every action measured and deliberate. His face was carefully blank, eyes fixed on the body.

“Fuel for your fire?” he asked, stopping next to her.

“Kindling,” Theta replied.

Koschei dragged a knuckle against the dead woman’s face, tracing the fragments of her shattered skull. “Claire Rook,” he said. Her eyes were still open, glassy grey orbs staring blankly up at Koschei’s ceiling. There was a smudge of scarlet on the back of his finger, and he wiped it off on the collar of Rook’s shirt. “I thought you didn’t do revenge.” He’d seen the article. Of course he had.

There was a thin sheen of oily grey over Rook’s skin, and she lay splayed on the table like a martyr, limbs stiff and fingers curled in against her palms like shrivelled claws. _Fitting for a vulture_ , Theta found herself thinking and, suddenly, she wanted to laugh. “I don’t.”

“What’s this, then?”

Theta twisted a lock of the woman’s hair around her finger and dropped it, watching it fall back into the cascade pouring off the table. “I don’t know,” she said. Her eyes were drawn to her rings—a braided gold band on her left middle finger, and a silver one encrusted with tiny jewels on her right forefinger. They wouldn’t fit in a few hours, she knew—hard to, when the skin they were fitted snugly around would start bloating, tightening beneath them like planks of wood warping beneath water in a vice. The thought brought some comfort—facts and science, she could deal with. Morality, she would not. “Settling a score? Doing a favour? Collecting a debt?”

She didn’t look up, refused to see the sardonic twist of his lip. “You feel that you’re owed?”

“I am,” said Theta. “We all are. We spend our lives paying the universe back for what we feel it's given us. ‘I owe you,’ ‘you owe me one,’ ‘I’ll pay you back,’ we say it all the time. It’s what makes the world go round.”

“ _Money, money, money_ ,” Koschei sang lightly. Despite herself, Theta snorted. Rook’s mouth was still open, and she saw, past thin blue lips, a purple tongue and black gums. “And Claire Rook fits into this, too,” he said. “How did you feel? Justified?” He moved around her, circling like a shark. Or a buzzard. “Vindicated?”

“Fitting,” said Theta, toying with the split ends of Rook’s hair. It would start falling out soon, she knew, cells dying and drawing away, loosening their hold on the wispy strands. “Justified.” It suddenly hit her how ridiculous the whole exchange was: two people discussing the nature of a kill over a corpse on a dining table. Madmen, both of them, doctors and patients, and killers in every sense. “Like everything was going to be okay.”

“Why?” What a simple question. Like the doorway to Narnia. You never knew what you were going to get: adventure and excitement, or a hundred-year war and a sword in your gut.

“You,” she answered. He looked up and his eyes met hers. She held contact unwaveringly. His eye twitched, and his gaze flicked away.

“I’ll make tea,” he said, straightening. Theta stepped back, tucking her hands in her pockets. “Why don’t you wait outside? I’ll need to clear the kitchen.”

“Just like old times,” said Theta drily.

Koschei smiled humorlessly, straightening his waistcoat. “You owe me,” he said.

Theta snorted.

***

Koschei slipped into the living room a little under twenty minutes later, holding a tray in one hand and shutting the door behind with the other. Theta didn’t ask what he’d done, or how he’d done it. In all honesty, she didn’t really care.

“Don’t break it,” he said, handing her a teacup.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” said Theta. “‘Course, if it did break, it wouldn’t be _entirely_ my fault. Delicate, these—bit impractical, don’t you think? If you’re going to pay this much for something, you might as well buy something a bit less breakable. ‘Sides, these are _small_. What’re you going to put in here that a good, old-fashioned—”

“God, don’t you ever shut up?”

Theta hid her grin behind the curve of the showy little cup. Koschei huffed and straightened his cuffs before picking up his own.

“Don’t think that I’m not flattered,” he said after he’d taken a sip, “but why come to me?”

Theta looked down into her tea. Her reflection, and the one of the moon through the skylight, looked back. “Because you’ve done it before.”

Silence. Theta took another sip of tea, eyes fixed on the rug.

“Do you trust me, Theta?”

She’d emptied her cup. She leaned forwards, placing it carefully on the coffee table. “I just brought a body to your home. What do you think?”

“You trusted me to take care of it, and to not tell anyone else,” he said. “That’s different from trusting me with yourself.”

“Common practice between a patient and a therapist,” said Theta.

“But you’re not my patient,” countered Koschei. “You said so yourself.”

“Would you rather I not trust you?”

“I’d rather you be honest.”

Theta leaned back, propping her toes up on the edge of the coffee table, if only to see Koschei twitch. “Well, now,” she said, “ _that’s_ different. Was never good at it, honesty. You remember.”

“I do.”

“Honesty and trust, they’re—” Theta tugged at her earlobe and sighed. “Difficult. I can trust you, but still be dishonest. They’re not two-way streets, more. . . three way, with a fork at every turn in the road, and a hidden path leading the other way. Can’t ever walk the same line as someone else, can you?”

Koschei hooked his ankle over his knee. “If truth and honesty are roads we walk,” he said, “am you walking towards me, or are you walking away?”

“If truth and honesty are paths,” said Theta, “I think I’d be standing still.”

“And where am I?”

“I don’t know.”

“The end of your path? Or standing behind you?”

“Running, I think.” She glanced over his shoulder, at the mirror hanging above him, covered in scratches, and the painting reflected within it. Red skies and crimson grass, and silver leaves drifting down a river of blood. White clouds, a stark contrast against the sanguine scene, and shadows that stretched from everywhere and nowhere. “Trying to keep up.”

“You find it hard to trust. You always have.”

She sneered. “Is this therapy, Dr. Oakdown?”

“You tell me, doctor.” Theta sneered. Koschei draped his arms over the armrests of his seat, leaning back. “Why Claire Rook?”

“You’ve already asked me that.”

“And what you gave me was hardly an answer.”

“Sometimes—” Theta hesitated. “Sometimes,” she said, “things—things don’t work out. Cases fall through, juries rule innocent, people get away with things they shouldn’t. Happens more often than most people would think, really. Small-minded, though that’s hardly their fault.”

“So you take it into your own hands,” said Koschei. “Vigilante justice. You’ve done this before.” A statement, not a question.

Theta drummed her fingers on her knees. “It’s hard to trust the law when you know how it works,” she said. “Just like you should never follow your own rules. Too many loopholes. Too much grey area you’ve mapped out for yourself. It’s not fair.”

“You worry about the fairness of the courtroom, but not your own?”

“Like you said, _Dr. Oakdown_ ,” said Theta, resting her elbows on her knees. “You remember.”

Koschei leaned forwards. “What changed, Theta?” he asked, voice barely above a whisper. They were close, their noses nearly brushing.

There was much that could be said about eyes. Windows to the soul, some people called them. The ends of the strings tying us to other people. Our anchors to the world. There was a lot that Theta supposed she should be able to see in Koschei’s eyes: the blood of Torvic, and Glospin, and a couple dozen other faces that she hadn’t even bothered to put names to, and misplaced blame tailing them both for decades. Hatred, love, anger, pain, all good contenders.

But she didn’t. All she saw was Koschei, and, maybe, even if she didn’t understand what that meant anymore, that was fine.

“You,” she said, and, before he could say anything else, she leaned forwards, and their lips touched. There were no fireworks, no gasps, not even a jump in her heartbeat. They didn’t close their eyes, or grab at each other, or open their mouths and devour each other whole. Just a press of skin against skin, like two old friends shaking hands after time apart, or a traveller finally returning home. A wave through a window, a nod from across the street, a conversation without a desk or barrier of words in between. A memory snatched from the air, like a leaf drifting on the breeze.

 _Koschei_.

She didn’t know what that meant, not anymore. She didn’t think he knew, either. But maybe that was fine, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> something something broken teacup


	11. Chapter Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was a painful thing, her smile, the way it tugged at her skin and seemed to catch on the inside of her mouth. It was barbed, and the further it stretched, the deeper the thorns curled. Her mouth was full of blood, and her frigid muscles creaked in harmony with the car.
> 
> She thought she laughed, at one point. Or maybe it had been a scream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am once again reminding you to heed the warnings

“Let’s go over that again.”

Theta resisted the urge to scream, or maybe cry. “Times,” she said, dragging the back of her hand down her face. “Places.” She hit the board with the end of her pen. The _smack_ seemed to rip through the room and she winced, temples throbbing. Jack scowled. "Relationships.” She plucked a red string with the tip of her finger. “None of them knew each other, none of them had anything in common. What else do you want, Jack?”

“I want _results_.” He scratched furiously at his forehead, slumping against the edge of the desk. Theta brushed her stack of scribbled notes away before he could sit on them, then scowled. Oh, what the hell. She swept her arm across the desk and they exploded into the air like a burst of autumn leaves, fluttering to the floor in droves. He glared at her and she very nearly stuck her tongue out in response. “Nothing?” he asked, for the hundredth time, it felt like (Twelfth. She’d counted). “Come on,” he wheedled. “ _Nothing_?” Thirteenth.

“What do you think I do, Jack?” She tossed the pen onto the desk and pushed her spectacles up the bridge of her nose with her fist. “You have everything I have,” she said, pinching her nose. “I’m a profiler, Jack. I do questions, and _Yes, and_ , not taking jaunts inside their brains. What have _you_ got?”

“You’re out of practice,” he accused, crossing his arms. Petulantly, she daresay. Haughtily. Unjustly. Stupidly.

“You’re incompetent,” she snapped, folding her glasses and tossing them onto the chair.

His glower never wavered as he reached into his pocket and fished around. She sneered and caught the stick of gum with only a tiny fumble.

(It had been Martha who’d come up with it first, and not for them, either. “I,” she’d said, first slapping a stick into Mickey’s hand, then one into Theta’s, “don’t want to hear a single word out of you— _either_ of you,” she’d added with a sharp look in Theta’s direction, “—until you’ve calmed down.”

“How does gum help?” Mickey had protested. Martha had glared at him, and he’d all but thrown the gum in his mouth and started chewing with fervor.)

Jack snapped his gum, passing it from one side of his mouth to the other with a grimace. “Am I wrong?”

Theta clenched her jaw. Rather than respond, she tossed her own gum into her mouth and bit down hard. A frigid burst of peppermint filled her mouth, making the back of her nose tingle and her eyes water. She sighed and slumped on the seat of her chair, staring sullenly at the board.

 _Process_ was a kind word she could imagine her uncle saying to her as he patted her cheek, smiling encouragingly. _Effort. You’re getting there. It doesn’t matter what it looks like. Would you like another Jelly Baby?_

_Clusterfuck_ was the word she preferred. _Mess_ , if she was in a forgiving mood. As she watched, a sticky note peeled off and fluttered sadly to the floor.

The map was a grotesque centerpiece, framed by photographs like branching veins and notes written in cramped, scratched scrawls reminiscent of ants marching across a page. More a mosaic of scribbles than anything nearer cohesion, it was littered with lines like lashes, nailed to the board with thumbtacks and chained with so much red thread it looked almost as if it had been painted. She scowled at it and reached across the table, snatching Jack’s cup and taking a swig of cold tea.

Faces never mattered quite as much.

Jack grimaced. “Maybe he’s making shapes” he suggested. “Symbols? Demonic sigils?”

“With three bodies?” He shrugged and blew a bubble. She sighed. “Could be working himself up to it,” she accepted grudgingly, pushing herself to her feet and tracing light lines between the pins on the map. The tip of her pencil bumped against the corkboard, skittering over the criss-crosses of highlighter and marker. It would qualify for modern art soon, if they weren’t careful. “Chinese character for ‘person,’ maybe,” she said. “Or a very bad, very incomplete spelling of _egg_ in Punjabi.”

Jack plucked the mug from her hand and took a long, hard gulp. “Pentagram?” He winced, wiping coffee from his chin with his sleeve. “Upside-down cross?” He spread his arms. “IKEA instructions?”

Theta pressed the heel of her hand against her nose, squeezing her eyes shut as she pressed down. “Enochian,” she muttered into her wrist. “Uh. . . _fam_. S. Mean anything, S?”

“Sex,” said Jack promptly.

She threw a highlighter at him. “Distance,” she said loudly as she sat back down, grinding her gum between her molars. “Weymouth, Whitchurch, Fareham.” She cocked her head. “Could be working in a zigzag,” she said, eyes trailing down the map. “Might want to look out around Crawley, then. . .”

“But none of them actually _lived_ where they were found.” Jack tossed a pen up and down, twirling it between his fingers with each pass. Theta wrinkled her nose. “They were moved. Brought. Whatever.”

“London.” Theta tapped her finger on her knee. “Camberwell, Peckham, and Farringdon.”

“Damn.” Jack’s face fell. “Fucking river,” he grumbled, pinching his gum between his teeth.

Theta glared at the map as if it had personally offended her, which, of course, it had. _It’s all deliberate with you, isn’t it?_ She bit the inside of her cheek. “It’s about making a point,” she said. “Emphasis.”

“Emphasis on what?” Jack scratched his hair furiously, nails rasping against his scalp. “What’s his theme?”

“It’s not how he kills them, it’s how he shows them.” Theta dragged her hand up and down her cheek. “Unless you see disembowelment as an accessory to hammers.”

“Symbolism,” Jack surmised, looking far from pleased about it. “That woman in the library, Eva Atkins—”

“Vanity?” Theta suggested. She’d seen the photos. She’d been beautiful, in the way of television stars and the covers of supermarket romance novels. It wasn’t the biggest of a leap a raging murderer might make.

(What a word, rage. Brilliant. Frightful. Horribly personal.)

“Well, someone call David Fincher!” Jack exclaimed, throwing his hands into the air. “Maybe he’d like to buy the rights! Who do you want to play you?”

“Got any better ideas?” Theta retorted.

Jack sank into his seat with a wince, rubbing his knee. “No,” he grumbled. He blew another bubble, staring up at the ceiling. “We don’t know _why_ ,” he said. “That’s the part that bothers me the most. How are we supposed to stop him if we don’t even know what he’s doing?” He turned to look at her, weariness etched into every line of his face. “How do they do this?” he asked.

He looked older. It wasn’t something she’d thought about before, but he did. Darker circles beneath his eyes that were a result of more than just a few late nights, lines around his eyes that weren’t quite wrinkles but were edging dangerously close, the thin shadows in darker, duller hair—dyed.

A year could do a lot, she supposed.

“Easy,” she muttered, crossing her arms. “It’s ‘cause they expect to fail.” She slid off the armrest and into the chair.

_Crunch_. She closed her eyes and swore.

Jack shook the cup, then tipped it back, slurping up the last few dregs. “Claire Rook’s dead,” he said suddenly. “Well, missing. But only officially.”

Theta kept her eyes closed. “Good for her,” she muttered, dragging her hands down her face. “Who’s that?”

He was, she guessed, looking at her incredulously, or maybe in amazement. The shocked kind, bordering on anger. “The journalist,” he said. She sneered behind her hands. “She wrote the article on you.”

She lowered her hands slowly. Jack’s face was shuttered, mouth set in a hard line. She couldn’t see his hands, but she would have bet her good hand that they were pressed flat against the bottom of the table. It was how he grounded himself.

It was how he hid himself in front of two-way mirrors.

“Okay,” she said.

“I have to ask,” he said.

“No,” she said softly. “No, you don’t.”

He didn’t flinch, but it was close. “Where were you, Theta?” he asked. “Tuesday, between two and four in the morning?”

“In bed.” She slid Jack’s cup towards herself and pried the lid off. She peered into it. It was empty, save for the thinnest rim of brown around the edges. She tipped the cup upside-down and brought it to her mouth. The droplet slid about halfway before rolling to a stop. She shook the cup, but the tea remained firmly stuck to the paper.

“Anyone to corroborate?”

Theta spat her gum into the empty cup and tossed it at the bin. It missed its mark by about a foot and clattered to the ground before rolling away. “Yes,” she said bitterly.

“Wait, really?” He sat up straight. “I—who? Are you okay?”

She flicked the lid across the table. It skidded off the edge and landed silently on the ground. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Just—” He fell silent. She didn’t bother to prompt him; she could fill in the gaps.

She twirled her pencil on the tabletop. The ferrule skittered across the surface like a parade of a hundred tin soldiers, or a bag of a thousand tiny beads exploding into a bell jar. It was enough to drive her to distraction, almost.

“Do I know them?” Jack asked.

Ah. Theta’s lip curled. “Might,” she said, catching the pencil between her thumb and forefinger. The wood was pitted and crushed where she’d bitten it, and the flakes of splintered paint tugged at her skin. “Starts with K, ends with _oschei_ , last name rhymes with hoedown.”

She stood before he could get another word in, brushing eraser dust from the seat of her trousers. “Bathroom,” she said over him, letting the door swing shut behind her. “Thanks, Jack.”

She managed to make it halfway down the hall before she burst into quiet, uncontrollable giggles.

***

She couldn’t sleep.

Not that that was news. Normally, there wasn’t a day that went by where she _could_.

This was not normal.

She was on fire, but she wasn’t. She was wreathed in blue flames, and still thinking they were cold. Her sheets were woven out of needles with the sharp ends up, and her eyes were leaking out of their sockets.

Really, she was just itchy.

 _They didn’t need to know each other_ , she could have told him. _He didn’t need to know them. He didn’t need to have a reason_.

She couldn’t, of course. He wouldn’t understand. And then he’d wonder how she did.

She couldn’t have felt worse if she’d been lying in a nest of ants. She kicked the blankets away, twisting and writhing out of the bedclothes, and swung her legs over the side of the bed. She shivered as the cool tile of the floor met her feet. Like a man standing on a bed of nails, except these ones pierced.

The car wasn’t one she’d seen before: a grey Ford with a scratch on the passenger-side door and a plastic dinosaur dangling from the rear-view mirror. The tires were scuffed, and it was in a parking space, but there was no ticket in the window. It took her less than a minute to pop the door open and slide into the driver’s seat, and another two before the engine rumbled to life, all without making a sound.

She tossed the crowbar over her shoulder, and it landed on the empty plastic bag in the back with a clattering _whap_. She gave the dinosaur a quick smack, then swerved away from the curb and down the seat.

The radio was buzzing out a jaunty electric rhythm, and the car shook with every thud of the bass. She tapped a gloved finger on the steering wheel in time to the drumming as she leaned over and pried open the glove compartment. She flicked through the stash of CDs, eyes flicking occasionally up to the empty street, until she finally managed to unearth an unopened _Lion King_ disk with a half-off sticker plastered over Simba’s face. She tore the plastic packaging off with her teeth and tossed it out the window before popping the disc into the player. The stereo crackled, and she jerked the wheel, screeching down a side street she’d once chased a cat down.

 _Nants ingonyama. . . bagithi Baba_. . .

She let her eyes drift shut and leaned back, hands resting lightly on the wheel. The wind whipped past, snatching at the music and dragging strands of hair out from beneath her hood.

It was a good night. Better, at least. The sky was an empty one, the moon a dull sliver behind a veil of clouds and the stars no more luminous than specks of dust catching sunlight as they drifted through the air during still summer evenings. The street itself was empty, save for her; cobblestone surrounded by high walls, behind which balconies and curtained windows were masked by towering trees and bundles of leaves only just beginning to turn red and wither in the wake of the first autumn winds. The streetlights were no more than smudges of gold beyond the edges of her vision, and, when she leaned forwards and flicked off her headlights, the street was thrown into darkness. A golden sort of black, like paintings of Parisian streets or photographs of the bottom of the sea. The kind of darkness you could see best in when you squinted, or caves that seemed to glow from the inside. It was the light that seemed to spill off walls and out of the ground at midnight, the kind of light that paved the paths in Hell.

She flexed her fingers on the wheel.

There was a man in the street.

The entire car jolted as she slammed into him and the windshield crunched as he flew into it. Her arms jerked and she was thrown forwards, nearly giving herself a concussion on the steering wheel. A noise like a bag of bricks tumbling through the dirt pervaded the air as the car rattled forwards, wheels skittering against the ground as if she were going over rocks, or a particularly uncooperative speed bump.

The wheel skidded when she slammed her foot on the brakes. The shift of the gear clicked like a trigger and she pressed down on the gas.

It was a wetter sound this time, like wet sand or glass shattering against mud. The car jolted again and she nearly hit her head against the ceiling, and so it went. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.

It was a painful thing, her smile, the way it tugged at her skin and seemed to catch on the inside of her mouth. It was barbed, and the further it stretched, the deeper the thorns curled. Her mouth was full of blood, and her frigid muscles creaked in harmony with the car.

She thought she laughed, at one point. Or maybe it had been a scream.

_And it moves us all_ —

She ripped the wires apart and the car skittered to a stop.

_It’s ‘cause they expect to fail_.

She dragged in a deep, clear breath through her mouth, then kicked the door open and stepped around the spreading swamp of black.

Circle of life indeed.

***

She was on him before he’d even fully opened the door, shoving him into the wall with more than just desperation and slamming their faces together, missing his lips by a mile. He returned in kind, grabbing her hair in his fists and tugging her forwards. She snarled into his mouth, fingers curling into his shoulder and his neck, biting his lip hard enough to nearly take it off.

“I did,” she hissed, hand flying down to dig into his hip with punishing force. He growled and grabbed her wrist. “You asked what changed,” she said, nails digging into the back of his hand. “I did.” He bit down on the junction between her neck and shoulder, and her other hand shot up to his hair, tugging sharply. “Still behind me,” she rasped.

 _Oh, Thete_. His buttons rained on the floor and she raked her knuckles down his chest in burning, bruising lines. _I always was_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mr. elton john sir i am so sorry 😔


	12. Chapter Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It wasn’t a scene from any film he’d ever seen; she was spread across the mattress like a starfish, brow furrowed and mouth agape, and there was a puddle of drool forming on the pillow. The sunlight didn’t stream through the window or paint her back with dappled gold, and her hair was greasy and tangled like nothing he’d ever seen. If he offered her his button-up, she’d probably punch him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mass update go brr
> 
> Sorry for the lack of updates! I was suspended from AO3 a month ago, and just got editing rights back about half an hour ago 😬If you don't follow me on tumblr, then you probably haven't seen the last, uh *check's notes* nine chapters! So **if you have just gotten back to this fic, please start reading at _by any other name_!**

You always remember your first. That’s how the saying goes, at least.

Koschei had always been an exception to the rules.

That wasn’t to say he’d _forgotten_ —he was sure he could remember, given time and prompting. It was just that he didn’t care to. If he’d wanted to remember, he would have.

Memories were fickle things, even for him. They had a way of slipping through the cracks but getting trapped in open doorways all the same, luring you closer then turning to mist the moment your hand closed around them. Tangible and solid one moment, never even there in the next, impossible and real in another. Amazing things, memories.

He’d been certain that Theta had forgotten him. He would have. He’d almost been convinced she had, the first few times he’d seen her.

Of course he’d seen her before. Central London was only so big. Just his luck to get stuck with the delusional idiot.

Temple Station had been the first time—a glimpse of copper-brown hair from across the platform, a flash of a lurid pink coat through the window, and then gone. Running across a street in Mayfair and tripping over her own feet when she turned around to wave at a car. A photo tucked into the corner of the middle of a low-cost little newspaper.

Not firsts, per se, but he remembered them nonetheless.

It wasn’t like he’d never been with anyone before. Quite the contrary. He’d had boyfriends, and girlfriends, and he’d once spent an eventful week with a person who had later been arrested for manslaughter and tax evasion. Some he’d hated. Some he’d liked. Some he’d even thought he’d loved. But none of them had been _her_.

It was everything else that was difficult, else being the everything. Body counts like notches in a bedpost, and groggy morning-afters revered like figures in a scripture. Names he couldn’t remember carved into marble and laid into palace walls, and dead, grey skin worshipped until it turned to dust in his hands.

The first never matters, Theta used to say, normally at the end of each term while calmly shredding her report and tossing the pieces out the window. _What’s the point in going on when you get it right from the get-go?_

A lovely sentiment, really.

He toyed with the corner of the pillowcase as he watched her sleep. Snore, really. Almost as if she could feel him staring, she furrowed her brow and snuffled into the pillow, scowling. The antithesis of every summer sonnet.

It wasn’t a scene from any film he’d ever seen; she was spread across the mattress like a starfish, brow furrowed and mouth agape, and there was a puddle of drool forming on the pillow. The sunlight didn’t stream through the window or paint her back with dappled gold, and her hair was greasy and tangled like nothing he’d ever seen. If he offered her his button-up, she’d probably punch him. He reached over and brushed her hair out of her face. She grunted, nose wrinkling, then rolled over, taking most of the sheets with her.

It had always been her, obviously. Maybe it was her fault, maybe it was his. Still, it wasn’t as if he could have been blamed for seeing her face when he let the oxygen into the old man’s IV.

(There was no point in feeling bad about it now, wasteful though it had been. Elegance had never mattered as much to her.)

Beside him, she sighed and rolled over again, tossing a leg over his side and resting her chin on his stomach. He took one of her hands, and her fingers linked with his automatically. If someone had told him a month ago that he would be _cuddling_ with Theta Lungbarrow, he would have laughed, then cried, then had a very nice dinner. Now, well. . .

It had taken him a few tries to get it right. Hospitals had always been dreary places, and he’d almost been able to risk the argument and quit. Alleyways hadn’t been much better.

He wondered if the man had even felt it when he’d finally slit his throat.

He liked to think of his life as a maze, or a ball of yarn. A labyrinth with only one way out, and he’d handed Ariadne’s string to Theta on a silver platter.

Murder was redundant and poetry was null. Wasn’t that always the way?

And, in the twilight zone between dreams and reality, he buried his face in her hair and whispered threats and promises and secrets that burnt, and wove tapestries of red across her mind.

In her sleep, against his heart, she smiled.

***

There was a glass of water on the bedside table when Theta awoke, and far, far too much light in the room.

She buried her face in her pillow with a groan that melted into a scream when the light didn’t go away. She grabbed around beside her and hurled the other pillow at the window when the light continued to be persistently, infuriatingly, unwaveringly _there_. There was a clatter and a splash; she gathered she’d knocked the glass over.

She looked up blearily, eyes squeezed to slits so narrow they may as well have still been closed, peering around the room.

The room. Not her room.

Koschei’s room.

Huh.

She rolled over, back to the window ( _open_ window—he had to be mad). His bed was soft, she noted, softer than the ones in her own home, and smelling faintly of sweat and lemons. A small allowance for elegance in a house that was all practicality and odd ends.

She plucked a hair out from between the sheets. She would, she knew, have to come up with something. An explanation, or something to say, at least.

She’d killed someone.

That wasn’t new.

She didn’t _like_ killing, per se. It was just something she did. Like going to the supermarket, or wiping her feet on the mat even when her shoes were clean. It was a part of the chaotic routine that no one in the world but her seemed to understand, and she stuck to it. Like leaning up to a peephole even though she knew she didn’t have one, and making her bed before going to sleep even though she knew they’d just get kicked away in the night. Habit.

There were some things she didn’t make habits of, though. She’d never killed two people the same way, and never left them the same way.

She’d never killed anyone without a reason.

She rolled over again, throwing her arms out to the side. Koschei’s mattress was firm where hers was squishy, and it shifted beneath her rather than let her sink into it. Like concrete, or carpet.

 _Koschei’s_ mattress.

Bloody hell.

She pressed her cheek against the pillow and took a deep breath.

Murder was a word she could associate herself with only partially. _Murders_. She solved them, she researched them, and she wrote the occasional paper about them for a journal with a fancy name. _Murder_. A simple word with a complicated meaning and vice versa, tied as deeply into her as her name or her face. _Murderer_. Her, sometimes.

The definition for ‘murder’ specifically excludes lawful killings. Wars don’t count. Executions don’t count. The man Jack shot in the neck their second year working together didn’t count.

What happened last night had not been lawful.

She dug her fingers into the pillow.

Something was cooking.

She grimaced and reluctantly rolled out of bed, landing in a heap on the ground. Her trousers were tossed over a lamp and she wriggled into them reluctantly, wrinkling her nose as she kicked away her balled-up socks. She left her shirt crumpled on the ground and tugged on her hoodie, still smelling like dead leaves and a stranger’s car.

She found the kitchen door squeezed between the hall closet and the stairs, open against the wall. Koschei stood at the stove, grinding garlic with his back to her.

The room was, despite the open window, sweltering. Theta peered around him at the faint glow of the oven. “What’s that?” she asked over the hum of the fan.

Koschei twisted the pestle. “Lunch.”

She frowned. “It’s morning.”

“It’s eleven.”

“Oh.” Theta walked forwards, bare feet sticking and peeling from the ground. “Still morning. Budge over.” She shoved the eggs aside before he could say anything and hopped up onto the counter, heels bumping against the cupboards below. He rolled his eyes, but said nothing.

She watched as he continued his assault on the cloves. “Have I ever called you an arse?” she asked.

“Repeatedly.” He didn’t look up from the garlic. “‘Morning, arsehole. Can I have your bacon?’ ‘Sorry, this is an arse-free zone.’ ‘It’s just weed, you arse.’ Pass the beef.”

“I’ve never asked for your bacon.”

“No,” he said, scraping the garlic into the pan, “you just took it. Beef.”

“And I’m pretty sure I was more creative than that.” She crossed her arms. “I don’t even _say_ arse that much.”

“I don’t care. _Beef_ , Theta.”

She sniffed the ground meat and wrinkled her nose. “That is _not_ beef.”

He nsatched the bowl from her. “They’re called spices, you heathen.” The pan sizzled as he scraped the meat into it, and the bowl clattered on the counter. “Off,” he said, tapping her knee.

She slid off and squeezed around him as best as she was able to. If the living room had been cramped, then the kitchen was a broom closet. She had to duck to avoid the pots hanging from the ceiling, and ended up hitting her forehead against an open cupboard door for her troubles. Koschei snickered and reached around her, sliding a knife out of the block. Its blade, wicked thin and sharp as flint, flashed in the dim fluorescent lights and she found herself following its movements as he deftly sliced the green onions. He glanced up, catching her gaze, and she quickly looked away, twirling a spoon across the counter with the tip of her finger.

He turned back to the chives. “So,” he said.

“Mhm.”

Each _crack_ of the blade hitting the cutting board seemed louder than the last, and faster, too, blending into one loud, long racket. “How’d you get here?” Koschei asked, lifting the board. The scrape of hard metal against wood made the hair on the back of Theta’s neck stand up, and she grimaced when he tapped the blade against the edge of the pan.

“Walked,” she answered, toying with the spoon.

He shot her a glance from the corner of his eye. “From Mayfair?”

She snorted. “No.”

“Why?”

She shrugged. “There’s usually a follow-up.”

He swirled the spoon around the pan. “There’s usually a conversation before the follow-up.”

“So we do things out of order. What else is new?”

Thin white slices of onion jumped in the pan, hopping over ridges of meat. Koschei pressed his spoon against one, crushing it into the oil. “Is that it?”

Theta picked at the counter. “Yep.”

Koschei cracked an egg on the edge of the pan. The shell splintered against the cast-iron, and caved even further when he dug his fingers into it and pried it open. The yolk splattered over the beef with a sizzle tantamount to an explosion. “Talk,” said Koschei, tossing the shell into the waiting basket by the sink and wiping his fingers on a rag. “I know you want to.”

She crossed her arms and leaned against the counter, air _whoosh_ ing out through her nose. She could, she knew, tell him about the car, about _The Lion King_ , about the nameless man whose only crime had been crossing the street. She could complain about how hard it was to find a car she could hot-wire quickly these days, worry herself silly about the body left to dry out on the street, or do anything else that involved thinking about it.

“He’s drugging them,” she said instead.

He glanced up from the eggs. “Who?”

She shrugged. “The copycat,” she said.

Koschei sprinkled salt over the pan. “And?”

Theta worked her jaw. “So does the Master.”

Koschei glanced up sharply. “Do you think he knows that?”

“Yes,” said Theta immediately.

“How?”

Theta grinned humorlessly. “Still trying to figure that out.”

“Copycat,” Koschei surmised.

“Shadow chasing the sun,” Theta muttered. Koschei’s lip curled.

“He wants an eclipse.”

“He’ll have a hard time finding it,” said Theta drily. “Creativity’s a vice.”

“‘John the Ripper,’” Koschei supplied, picking up the pepper grinder. “That’s what the tabloids are saying.”

Theta grimaced. At least Claire Rook had been creative. “Heard someone call him Mi-kill-angelo the other day, if you can believe it,” she said. Koschei snorted and Theta allowed herself a small grin.

“What makes you so sure?” Koschei asked.

The grinding of the pepper sounded too much like the scraping of wheels for Theta’s liking. She forced herself to swallow, wetting her lips. “Makes sense,” she said. “The most sense,” she corrected. “He would, if he’s smart.”

“Smart enough,” said Koschei lightly, clicking the oven off and moving the pan off the heat. “Milk?” She shook her head. Koschei crouched, peering into the oven. “How long have you been hunting him?” he asked.

She frowned. “Three months. You know tha—”

“Not the copycat.” Koschei pulled the oven door open and a waft of heat burst out, enough to scorch Theta even from where she stood. “The other one.” He reached in with a gloved hand. “The Master.”

The tray hit the stovetop with a clatter of metal and tinfoil and the oven slammed shut. Theta watched steam waft off the gleaming meat. “Why?”

He tossed his oven mitts onto the counter. “Curious,” he said.

She was silent for a moment. “Four years,” she said. “Give or take. I think.”

“Give?” Koschei asked, easing the tinfoil from the tray. “Or take?”

“Give.”

“You don’t sound pleased,” he observed.

“Would you be?”

He smiled humorlessly. “No,” he said, “I guess not.”

“It’s a pain.”

“Bet you anything he feels the same,” said Koschei, putting a plate down on the counter.

“Bet you more he’s laughing his arse off.”

“Victorious,” noted Koschei. He lifted the tinfoil, sliding it away, and the roasted golden heart tumbled onto the plate. “Can you empathize with that?”

“Therapy’s hardly good morning after etiquette,” Theta only half-quipped.

The corner of Koschei’s lip twitched. “Fine.” He crushed the tinfoil into a ball and tossed it at her. She caught it with only a minor fumble, grabbing it in her fist. The raised lumps and edges cut into her skin, pushing back and digging in where she pressed it with her thumb. She clenched it tighter, and a rivulet of juice ran down her wrist. There was a metaphor there, she was sure.

As Koschei scraped the scramble into a bowl, Theta found her gaze drawn back to the heart. It looked surprisingly small; the size of her fist, maybe bigger. Made smaller by the plate, but bigger by its place. It didn’t even _look_ like a heart anymore. A curl of meat (Beef, maybe, or turkey. Something dark.) bloomed from the centre of it, brown and roasted at the edges.

It was different, seeing it laid out on a plate instead of frozen in a case or languishing against bone, and hard to believe what it had once been.

_Once been_. Because it wasn’t that, not anymore. The butcher, or the farmer, or the hunter had drained it of all that. Not life, not death. Just food.

Very good food, if the smell was anything to go by.

“Have you ever had heart before?” asked Koschei, picking up the bowl he’d set aside earlier.

“Chicken,” she replied, watching as he drizzled crimson sauce over it. It ran over it, pooling around it on the plate below. “At a cookhouse, for a birthday.”

Had he smiled, she would have called it a sneer. “Lamb’s a bit different.” He put down the bowl and picked up the knife from where he’d discarded it. One swift movement and he’d parted the rose. Fine, chopped onion spilled out, and the sauce turned ground white stuffing pink. He offered the thin slice to her on a fork. “Try it.”

It was like clay beneath her teeth, soft as velvet, firm as bone. Juice, hot enough to burn, flooded her mouth, carrying with it a hard, gamy burst and a tender sort of sweetness she couldn’t quite place. She could feel every fiber of muscle on her tongue, the searing wetness of fat, and the muted burn of garlic mingling with a warmth that seemed to melt on her tongue.

She swallowed. “Lamb,” she said doubtfully.

Koschei smiled. “More?”


	13. Chapter Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There were worse things. She knew that. She’d lived them. There was always something worse.
> 
> That didn’t mean life had to prove it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy march 365th everybody
> 
> that you should heed the warnings is probably a given at this point

Somehow, she knew what it would be before the phone had even stopped ringing.

Punctuality was a virtue, after all.

***

Talking had never been something that they did. Not then and not now, even when they, by definition, had to.

She had a key to his house, and he one to her flat. She’d hung up one of her coats in his closet, and shoved a few T-shirts into the corner, and there was a neatly-folded suit and stack of woolen purple socks in the bottom drawer of her dresser. There were spare toothbrushes in both their bathrooms, and when he started stocking his pantry with custard creams, neither of them mentioned it.

It’s not domestic, not quite, but it’s close.

(She’d done domestic, once, or what passed for it, and maybe that’s why everything went wrong.)

“Why’d you become a doctor?” she’d asked one night, balancing spoons on the edge of her cup.

Questions just aren’t something she needs right now. She suspects it might be the same for him.

“Why’d you?” he’d countered, carving strips from his jerky. Veal, apparently. _More tender_ , he’d told her. _I’ve got a friend on a farm_.

She’d pointed a fork at him in warning as she’d carefully placed her knife on top of her pyramid of cutlery. He’d rolled his eyes. “Family.” He’d torn a bit of his meat off with his teeth. “Thought it best to avoid the argument, and it pays well.”

“Psychiatry, though?” She’d spun the end of her fork on the tabletop. “Hardly your forte.”

“Surgery made me queasy,” he said blandly. She’d snickered and he had, without looking up, reached over and shifted her mug. The assorted silverware had clattered to the table and the ground and she’d made a noise of dismay, lowering the knife she’d been about to crown as the capstone. “What about you?” he’d asked again.

***

There were worse things. She knew that. She’d lived them. There was always something worse.

That didn’t mean life had to prove it.

The ground squished and squelched beneath her, and her feet ached from cold where the mud had seeped through her trainers. It was wet between her toes, and the sodden wool of her socks was so cold it was almost warm.

She slipped, and her arms flailed as she skidded on slick earth. “Woah!” Jack grabbed her before she could fall, yanking her upright. “You alright?”

Her fingers dug into his arm. “When?” she panted.

She didn’t have to look at him to know he was watching her. “Just before I called,” he said.

She saw the bodies like shapes in the distance, small and out of focus and blurred at the edges, despite the bare distance between them. Limbs stiff and bent at broken angles, hair brittle like sheets of flax in the wind, ramrod spines and icy silver twine.

She knew who it was. Of course she did. Or rather, she didn’t (she thought). Jack, too. She couldn’t decide whether he looked triumphant or furious. She didn’t think he could, either.

Her knuckles were white, and her hands were shaking. She let go of Jack’s arm, arms like lead. The weight of his hand vanished from her shoulder, but that only served to make her heavier.

The wind nipped at her cheeks and she shivered, pulling her jacket tighter around herself. Like needles, maybe, or sandflies in the summer. Like the bitter sting of ice and something else she doesn’t have a word for.

Horror doesn’t dawn. It doesn’t creep in, or drag itself over the horizon, or give you time to shut the blinds. It’s the leeching drag of a thunderstorm, or a hail of flames, or the snap of a broken pin and crash of metal jaws. It’s autumn leaves and missing basements and the creak of bedsprings in the dead of moonless night. Its thorns and claws and barbed, shackled promises digging into skin and tearing through flesh and dragging across stripped white bone.

It’s daydreams and nightmares and memories she turns over her fingers like a tarnished coin made flesh and blood on a grassy moor.

It was as close to perfection as she thought anyone could hope to get.

It was ingenious, really. Original. Masterful. Positively enterprising. She could hardly even see the stitches.

Wire frames worked well enough for artists. Metal rods in place of bone was only the next logical step. A scaffold of creation.

Terror, she thought, and reverence were easily confused. The man was folded at his waist, feet floating on the ebbing ripple of the creek. There was something unearthly about the thin layer of frost over his skin, like she was looking at him from behind a veil, or through a haze of clouds.

Or through a frame.

(“What about you?”

She’d flicked a fork with the tip of her finger and it had bounced across the table. “It was easy,” she’d decided to say. “And I wanted to see if I could.”

He’d snorted and tossed a cut of jerky to her.)

The shattered skull was a nice touch. Arms spread wide, chest empty and caving, jaw pried open to show an empty mouth.

If she squinted, she could almost see the raised skull reflected in the frozen expanse of his skin.

 _Faceless, nameless, and absolutely worthless_.

Lower than a rat, cowering at her feet like a bug. A mosaic of memory and worship.

 _Like waking up in a hospital bed with Jack dozing on her legs, his own wrapped in casts, and being suffocated with the smell of death and tea and antiseptic, like headlights and sirens and sprays of snow blinding her as she shivered in the middle of a frozen highway, like standing on a bluff and screaming and hurling the ring that had never been worn over the edge_.

Her eyes fell on the twisted, frozen cords binding her fingers to the skull, she imagined the twine cutting into the skin of her own hands and adding to the patchwork of scars and invisible stains.

 _Like swinging a stone at the back of a head and hearing a crack, like doing it again, like doing it again, like doing it again and again and again like it had been the easiest thing in the world_.

You’d have to have been there.

_Like a furious, whispered argument and a slap echoing through the silent space, like sterile white walls and plastic windows, like unopened envelopes lined up neatly between her mattress and the frame. Like snow and rooftops, rocks and rivers, tears and cobwebs, like shattering an empty glass on a polished headstone and stomping the pieces into the earth._

Like the pinned edges holding the painted, frozen smile on her face.

It was almost enough to distract from the two blackened, frozen hearts impaled on the jut of white ribs.

Really, she should have guessed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah it's short but so is the history of the human race so


	14. Chapter Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He slammed a crisper shut and her hand tightened around the shaker. “So,” she said. “Murder to cannibalism, how does that work?”

Koschei’s house was always warm. Theta would have gone so far as to say that he prided himself on it. Central heating truly was a modern wonder.

She sat at the table, and she felt cold.

She heard the buzz of the lock, muffled through the walls, and the click of the door swinging open. “In here,” she called.

“Figured,” Koschei called back. Her fingers twitched, spasming into a fist. She forced herself to relax as he nudged open the door, a shopping bag in each hand and a bag of crisps beneath his chin.

“Good day?” she asked.

He shot her a quizzical look. “No,” he said. “You?”

“Oh, yeah.” She nodded fervently. “Great corpses. Real sociable.”

“Good for you,” he said drily, dropping the bags on the floor.

She dragged her hands across the table, knuckles bumping against the faintest ripple of grain. It was clean. It was always clean. Just like everything else in the house, cluttered as it was. Shining floors and pristine bathrooms and IKEA mugs polished like fine crystalware. It was as if the house had never known dust. The table was as smooth and uninterrupted as glass beneath the pads of her fingers, and when she curled her hands against the wood, not a single crumb caught beneath her nails.

Even the salt shaker was clean. She dragged it towards herself and tilted it lightly to the side. The white was stark against the deep red of the wood; horrible little grains of imperfection.

Immaculate. That’s what it was. Immaculate.

It had amazed her when she’d laid Claire Rook out, and it amazed her now. Was it through choice, she wondered, or necessity?

Both, she suspected.

Koschei tugged the fridge open. “Going to help?” he asked.

“Nope.” He glared at her over his shoulder and she grinned cheekily. He snorted and turned around.

Her smile slid off, and her eyes roamed around the room. How long had it been since the first time she’d stepped foot in it? A month, maybe more? Two, even? She could remember the air of that night, the colour of the clouds, the smell of motes and old sausages that had lingered in her hair for days afterwards no matter how hard she’d scrubbed, but she couldn’t remember the date. It had happened; that was all that mattered.

The knives were on the counter, nestled neatly in their block, two feet away from him and six away from her. He knew all their names; they’d been part of the grand tour, and she’d been skeptical enough to Google to check. He liked to sharpen them on Wednesdays, running the stone against the blades until they flashed like broken light made solid. The handle of the closest one was barely an arm’s length from him, and she knew he kept the meat hammer in the cupboard above his head.

He slammed a crisper shut and her hand tightened around the shaker. “So,” she said. “Murder to cannibalism, how does that work?”

He faltered. Theta didn’t move, didn’t make a sound—just watched, and waited. “Would you believe me if I told you it was faster than getting groceries?” he finally asked.

Theta let out the breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. “Why?”

“That’s a loaded question.” He put the milk on the top shelf and shut the door. “Afraid you’ll have to be more specific, love.”

He’d never called her that before.

She stood, the legs of the chair scraping against the floor. He turned, keeping one hand pressed to the fridge.

_ Why _ .

_ Why kill them? _ she could have asked.  _ Why butcher them? Why eat them? Why keep doing it? Why did you choose them? _

_ Why did you lie to me? _

“Master,” she said instead.

He dragged in a long, deep breath that made her chest hurt just listening to it, then let it out again with a  _ whoosh _ . “Creative,” he said. “Hardly ingenious, I’ll admit. But creative.” His head jerked in an aborted twitch. “Did you come up with that?” He almost would have sounded debonair, had his voice not trembled at the end.

She wasn’t sure that the noise she made qualified as a laugh. “No. Do you like it?”

“Yes.”

It was absurd, Theta recognized, somewhere in the back of her mind. The conversation, the banter, everything. It was absurd that she was standing there, that she hadn’t called, or broken his nose, or tackled him to the ground.

That she was, remarkably, calm.

“You fed me his heart,” she said softly.

He drummed his fingers on the fridge door. “Did you like it?”

She hurled the shaker to the ground. It shattered, and salt exploded across the floor. Koschei didn’t move. “I’ll take that as a no,” he said.

“Shut up.” She flexed her fingers on the tabletop, rocking forwards on her heels. He leaned back, shoulders bumping into the fridge. “Just—” She shook her head.  _ Just _ .

Koschei’s hands curled into fists behind him, knuckles mottled white and green. “Are you going to arrest me?”

She let out her breath through her nose. “No.”

He cocked his head. “Kill me?” he suggested.

Her stomach roiled. “No,” she growled.

_ Why help me, hold me, listen to me? _

“Because you wanted to,” she asked, “or because you could?”

His breath whistled through his teeth and he tilted his head back. Her gaze flicked to his throat (She could, she knew, if she wanted to. Throw herself over the table, across the room, and end it. Throttle him, or cut his throat with an edge of broken glass. She could). “Could,” he decided. “And you?”

(She wouldn’t.)

“And I what?”

He tilted his head, staring mock-placatingly at her. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said. “That’s not how you see it, is it?”

She ground her teeth. “That’s—”

“What, different?”

“You’re delusional,” she hissed.

“And you’re a bloody hypocrite,” he snarled. “Tell me, why am I still here? Or—” he spread his arms and looked around the room, eyes widening mockingly, “alive, for that matter?”

Her nails were carving crescents into her palms, and her knuckles burned, rubbed raw against the table. “Was it power?” she asked harshly as she rounded the table, dragging her fist behind her. “Power over them? That’s a common reason—but you wouldn’t like that, would you?” She dragged her teeth over her lower lip. “ _ Common _ . Not you, never you.”

He chuckled darkly. “And you?” he countered, leaning against the counter. “It’s the rage, isn’t it? You try to keep it down, I know you do, but. . .” He tutted and shook his head, resting stiffly on his elbows. “Never works, does it?” He rolled his head on his shoulders. “ _ Pressure pushing down on me _ ,” he sang. “ _ Pressing down on you, no man ask for _ —”

“Were you lonely, Koschei?” Theta asked sweetly, a condescending smile pulling at the edges of her mouth. “You keep them with you this way, don’t you? Always a part of you. Literally. Best—” she clapped. It rang through the room like the crack of a gun, and he jolted like he’d been shot. “Trophy.”  _ Clap _ . Scowl. “Ever.” She kept her hands together. The sound lingered as if to burn ringing in the back of her skull.

Her arms dropped to her sides and silence fell, thick and deadening as a blanket of lead. “But that’s still not it, is it?”

He stepped forwards. “Where’s Jack, Theta?” Glass crunched beneath his feet. “Why isn’t he chasing me down right now?” And then, softly, “Where’s your cavalry?”

They were almost nose-to-nose. Theta swallowed, and the click of it seemed to reverberate like a scream in an empty cathedral. “There were more.” Not a question.

“Yes,” he said plainly.

“Couldn’t put in the effort?” It might have been a taunt, once. There was no derision, no mockery. Just barbs and ire and what could be empty scorn.

“Couldn’t bother,” he replied promptly. “What about you?”

“No.”

“No?” He tilted his head. She could feel his breath, coming hot and fast, and she wanted to scream. “Could, but wouldn’t?”

“That is not what I’m talking about, and don’t you dare pretend otherwise,” she hissed.

“I’m not the one pretending, dear,” he snarled. She grabbed his arm, nails digging into his skin, and he bit out a hiss of pain. “No one asked you to kill Claire Rook,” he growled, hand flying to hers.

She tightened her grip. “No one asked  _ you _ to cook her.”

He dragged his thumb across her wrist, the tip of it hovering over the frantic butterfly beat of her pulse beneath paper-thin skin. “You did.”

She yanked her hand away, leaving white lines that turned red even as she watched in her wake. “How many?”

He sneered as he rubbed his arm. “Ask nicely.”

“ _ Koschei _ .”

“Oh, like you know,” he snapped.

“I do,” she barked before she could stop herself.

He stared at her. “Oh?”

“How,” she growled, “many?”

“You first,” he breathed.

“Don’t—”

“Test you?” He straightened like he had never done it before, arms twisted in front of him. “Why? What’ll you do?”

She stepped back, and her back touched the table. “Was—” She growled, biting off her words, and he raised an eyebrow “Was it  _ fun _ ?” she forced out. “I don’t—”

“Yes,” he said, crossing his arms. “Immensely.” Her breath came out in a wheeze that almost sounded like a giggle and she dropped her head, scrubbing her hands through her hair. “Don’t tell me you don’t like it too.”

“I don’t,” she said automatically.

“Oh,  _ right _ .” He clasped his hands in front of himself, squeezing his eyes shut. “It’s  _ duty _ , isn’t it? That’s what you think it is?”

“And you’re just having the time of your life, aren’t you.” The words came out flat.

His eyes snapped open. “You never left it alone,” he said softly. “Why should I?”

She stared back at him, the table and more between them. “You are not my fault,” she said.

“What a fine assignment of blame.”

She buried her fists in the folds of her coat. “It hasn’t been four years for you, has it?”

He let out a bark of laughter. “Your first or mine?”

“Who’s the copycat?” she asked. It seemed like a frivolous thing to ask. He gave her a look.

“What, do you actually care?”

_ No _ . “Who?” she repeated with patience that she didn’t feel.

“Why would I tell?”

“So you know.”

“I didn’t say that.”

She wanted to hit him. She wanted to scream. She wanted to run, to shout, to drown in blood that wasn’t her own, to bury her face in a dead man’s chest and weep.

She wanted to—

(Speaking, she liked to believe, meant accepting. Meant making the words real. Speak a lie into existence, and it shall be. Spin a truth, and then it is.

Sometimes, she really hated herself.)

She did what she did best.

She left.

***

She could have picked the lock, or stolen his key. But breaking the window was just so much more satisfying.

Thank God for modern architecture.

Glass crunched beneath her feet as she slid through. She stared distastefully around the room.

She’d never liked it, not even in the beginning.  _ Especially _ in the beginning. It wasn’t even Koschei; it was just the office itself. Too bold, too big, too much. The clutter of his house and the graveyard of plastic water bottles in the back of his car were familiar—reassuring, even. Normal. Real. The office was just so much less.

The filing cabinet clattered like the wheels of a hearse as she yanked the drawer out. Loud, too loud, in the air of a crypt.

She half-expected it to have been empty. For him to have swooped in, somehow, and snatched it away from under her.

He wouldn’t have, of course. Wouldn’t have had the chance.

(Was it fair play, really, when neither of them had known they were playing?)

The floor shook when she yanked the first drawer out, and the  _ clang _ of her kicking it over made her ears ring. The air exploded with paper, notes and files and carefully printed forms billowing around her like a tornado of leaves in the autumn, or ashes caught in a winter storm. The second drawer followed suit, edges dragging trenches in the hardwood floor as she flung it across the room.

She was burning. Raging,  _ burning _ . There was a cut on her hand (from glass or metal, she didn’t know), but she barely even noticed. She kicked the cabinet in the side, and a noise like a hollow gong rang through the room.

She couldn’t breathe, could hardly feel even herself through the fire scorching her from the inside out. Her heart was pounding. Or maybe it had already stopped.

She kicked the cabinet again, and again, then rammed it with her shoulder. It wobbled with an ominous creak and she slammed her knee against it.

A  _ crunch _ like bones beneath unforgiving stone ripped through the air as the cabinet slammed into the side of the desk. Wood splintered and creaked, and she felt the shake in her bones when the empty cabinet finally hit the ground.

She hadn’t screamed, not even once. It would have felt wrong to; breaking the fragile peace of madness and white noise.

(She didn’t think that she’d have been able to, if she’d tried; that she’d open her mouth and nothing would come out.

What was there to scream for, anyway? Herself?

Unlikely.)

She dragged her hands through her hair and down her face. Her cheeks were wet, she realized.

Sweat, she decided. Just that.

She kicked pages aside as she waded through the quagmire. Petulant, compared to how she felt, and childish, but satisfying when she lifted her boot and saw a crinkled footprint on paper.

She was almost tempted to call what she found pathetic. It almost was.

Pathetic wasn’t bodies. Pathetic wasn’t tragedy.

It was thinking he was worth it.

She was good at logic, good at reason. Emotions were easy to shut out, to ignore. Save the child or the compound? Shoot him now or let him run?

There was no reason to this.

So she sat there, kneeling in the midst of the mess of papers and glass, the only one that really mattered clenched in her fist.

Her hands were shaking again.

The office wasn’t a grave. It wasn’t a mausoleum, a tomb, a vault, a shrine. To say it was would be to say that something had been lost. Gone. Killed and forgotten and shut away to rot.

It wasn’t.

There hadn’t been anything to lose in the first place.

She typed out a quick message to Jack, then dropped the phone as if she’d been burnt.

_ Found him _ .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am once again getting ready to throw hands with google docs italics


	15. like a mayfly, but worse.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I could kill you,” Adam repeated. It was almost a mantra. It would have been amusing, had it not been so annoying.
> 
> He wasn’t even worth her bullet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a master-pov chapter? in MY masterversary fic?? it's less likely than you think.

Koschei swore as the sticky note peeled off the page and fluttered to the ground. He dropped the book on the couch next to him and leaned down, peeking between and around his feet. He scowled, and settled for kicking at the ground with his heel and hoping he’d pushed it under the couch. Neon green was inconspicuous, right?

He puffed out an irritated puff of breath as he picked up the appointment book again, flipping through to find the right page again (no, the pages did not flap through his fingers in one loud, satisfying wave—it spoke to the paper’s quality, he supposed, but it was still a bit annoying). Things would, he knew, have been easier had he still had a receptionist, but she had, without a word of warning, vanished a little less than a week ago, with only a digital trail to suggest she’d move to France. He’d contemplated a switch to an online booking system, but the breakdown he’d nearly had over the primitive website creator just hadn’t been worth it (Since when did you have to _buy_ a URL?) (He’d had a dream about the late woman herself that night, where she’d danced a jig on a giant mushroom while dressed as a can of Vimto and sung a variation of _For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow_ with her—or his, he supposed—own lyrics; something about impulsive decisions coming back to bite him in the arse?) (The first thing he’d done upon waking was throw a jug of milk out the window. It had been deeply cathartic).

He definitely did _not_ pout as he flipped through the pages at what was a perfectly normal, not dramatically slow, pace. _August 13th, August 14th, August 15th. . ._

He glanced at his watch, then scowled and snapped the appointment book shut. He was late.

He _really_ needed to hire a new receptionist.

He drummed his fingers against the hard leather cover and tapped his heel, first against his shin, then against the couch. He hummed the opening verse of _Bohemian Rhapsody_ , then gave the leg of his expensive coffee table a good, solid kick.

He checked his watch again. Five minutes, he decided. Five minutes, and he would put on a silly accent and leave a rude message on Adam Oliver Mitchell’s answering machine.

Three minutes and thirty-two seconds later, there was a knock on the door. Koschei tilted his head back, and waited.

Another knock. Koschei sighed and pushed himself to his feet. “Come in.”

The door swung open. _Greasy_ , was his first thought. _Greasy, specky, and uuuuuugggh_.

“Dr. Oakdown?”

“That’s what it says on the door.” Koschei gestured for him to come in. “You’re Adam?”

“Yeah.” He strode forwards and took Koschei’s hand, giving it a quick shake. Koschei forced himself to smile, and tried not to let him see him wiping his palm on his trousers. “Great. We talked over the phone, yeah?”

“We did.” Koschei nodded. “Please, sit down. Oh—” Adam paused, half-crouched, rear hovering over the seat. He raised an eyebrow. “Other seat,” said Koschei, gesturing, open-handed, at the couch across from his.

Adam’s expression faltered for the briefest of moments before he grinned again. “Right.” He stood up, patting his palms on his legs. “Sorry. Should’ve guessed.”

Koschei pressed his tongue against clenched teeth. _Yes, you should have_. “Don’t worry about it.” Adam flopped down into the patient’s seat and Koschei sat down, crossing his leg. “Well,” he said, “how would you like to do this?”

Adam leaned forwards, elbows on his knees. “I’ve never been to therapy before,” he admitted, looking only mildly pleased at the fact. “What’s it all about?”

“Well, it can be anything,” said Koschei. “You could use this time to work through anything that might be troubling you, or just to get something off your chest.”

“Right.” He nodded. “So. . .” he waved a hand vaguely, “just talking?”

“Anything you like.”

“Right.” He nodded again. “Right. Well. That works.” He cleared his throat and sat up ramrod-straight, drumming his palms against his legs. “Things haven’t been going well at work,” he said.

Koschei resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “How so?” he asked, never letting the pleasant smile falter.

“There’s—” He folded his hands in his lap. “I’m a research assistant at Stewart’s, see,” he said. “I’m putting in a proposal for my own project, actually,” he added, brushing a non-existent strand of hair behind his ear in lieu of shyness.

Koschei’s lip almost twitched. Almost. “That’s very impressive,” he forced himself to say, “especially at your age.” He tilted his head, furrowing his brow. “What’s the problem?”

Adam shrugged, but there was a stiffness to the motion that put more in mind the image of marching around a room and screaming than quiet discontent. “It’s one of my partners, see,” he said. “Walters. His name’s Walters.” He paused.

Koschei nodded. “Go on.”

He took a deep breath. “It’s a little thing,” he said. “And, really, it shouldn’t be bothering me as much as it does—” He stood up abruptly, legs locking stiff. “I—I really shouldn’t be bothering you with this,” he said. “I’m sorry, I’ll go, I—”

“Adam,” Koschei said, raising his voice to break through his ceaseless babbling. “Please, sit down.” He gestured at the couch. Adam stared at him, then, with an exaggerated hesitance that made Koschei want to seriously consider buying a shotgun, sank back into his seat. “Trust me,” said Koschei, keeping his unblinking gaze on Adam’s, “when I say that no problem is too small. “That’s why you’re here, remember.”

Adam dragged in a slow, rattling breath. “I hate him,” he whispered. “I hate him, swear to God I do. It’s—” His hands were still and folded in his lap, but his knuckles were locked white. “It’s ridiculous, isn’t it?”

Koschei raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“Everyone has someone they don’t get on with, don’t they?” said Adam. “It’s ridiculous, doing all this because—”

“Why do you hate him?” asked Koschei.

Adam blinked, dumbstruck. “What?” he asked incredulously. The air of _did you just interrupt me?_ positively dripped from him.

“Tell me about Walters,” Koschei requested. “Don’t think about it,” he said as Adam opened his mouth. He could almost hear the clack of teeth as he snapped his jaw shut. “Just. . .” he spread his hands, “say what comes to mind.”

“His ego,” Adam said, almost before Koschei had finished speaking. “He thinks he’s so much better than everyone else, and he marches around like he owns the place—he _doesn’t_ ,” he added sharply, as if he’d been expecting Koschei to argue. “He’s not even in charge. We’re practically the same level. It’s only ‘cause he joined first that we’re not.”

“Your positions,” Koschei interrupted. “He’s above you?”

Adam bristled. “You wanted me to talk.”

“I do,” Koschei reassured him. “Your positions,” he repeated.

Adam bit down on the corner of his lip. “It’s ‘cause I’m younger, that’s why,” he said. “They think I can’t take on the responsibility.”

“They’ve said this to you?” Koschei asked. The perfect mix of surprise and indignation. Adam puffed up.

“It’s obvious,” he said. “He knows it, too.” He narrowed his eyes at Koschei. “You’re going to say I’m being paranoid, aren’t you?” he asked, mouth twisting in resignation.

Koschei tilted his head in polite surprise. “Why would I say that?”

“It’s what I would say,” Adam answered imperiously.

Koschei tamped down the urge to laugh. “The world isn’t as perfect as most people like to pretend,” he said. “I’m sure even those self-help gurus have people they’d like to throttle.” Adam snorted. Koschei’s mouth curved. “Everyone deals with their problems a different way.”

“Yeah?” Adam tapped his foot. “How do I deal with mine, then?”

“Well.” Koschei smiled. “That’s up to you, now isn’t it?”

***

It’s not the only thing he wants to discuss. _Obviously_. Far from it, in fact, ranging from topics that made Koschei want to burst out laughing at the absurdity of it all to ones that could have put him to sleep better than any pill or soothing cup of tea. Eventually, though, what he gathers is this:

  1. Adam Mitchell is an idiot.
  2. He doesn’t know this.
  3. Rather, he believes quite the opposite.
  4. He’s quite possibly the most narcissistic person Koschei has ever met, present company not included.
  5. Has he mentioned that he’s an idiot?
  6. Koschei has never been more tempted to violate the Hippocratic oath in his life.



Later that night, with the door locked and windows shuttered, Koschei goes through the day's appointments. He hums along to some tune or another, crossing out names, marking down dates, and doodling rude caricatures in the margins (What? It’s not like anyone will ever see them). He makes a note underneath her slot to refer Anwen Liu to one on the list of colleagues because he just didn’t need her anymore think he was the right fit for her, poor dear, what a sweet girl, hope she gets the help she needs from someone who can give it to her, love to the family, et cetera, et cetera.

He pauses by the name he’d written in the one o’clock spot and, after a brief moment of consideration, makes a small, dark mark next to Adam Mitchell’s name.

***

“. . . _wrong_ with a break in procedure, and if it gets the job done—which it did, by the way, and better _and_ faster than his method would’ve—then who cares? I did an internship with him once, you know, and, honestly, I’m not surprised that he’s only part-time—”

“Adam,” said Koschei. “I’d like to talk to you about Walters.”

“—tell the difference between right and left, sometimes. _God_ , do you ever feel like you’re surrounded by idiots?”

 _You have no idea_. “Adam,” he repeated.

“—looking for another job. There’s got to be somewhere I can do better—”

“ _Adam_.” Adam’s jaw snapped shut with an audible _click_. “Last time you were here,” said Koschei, endeavoring not to snarl, “you mentioned work.”

Adam shot him a quizzical look. “I’m still talking about work,” he said, as if speaking to someone exceptionally slow. He looked a bit like how Koschei constantly felt and _wow_ , that was a horrifying thought.

“I know,” said Koschei. “In a narrower sense, though. Walters?”

It was as though a gloomy blotch of a cloud had been covered by an even larger, uglier one. Adam scowled, expression stormy. “I’m in a good mood,” he said. “I’d rather not fuck that up, thanks.”

The corner of Koschei’s lip jumped and he pinched the inside of his mouth between his canines. “The point of therapy,” he said, “is to talk about these things, and find a way for you to deal—”

“I thought therapy was whatever I wanted it to be,” Adam growled.

“—and come to terms with them,” Koschei continued, as if Adam hadn’t even spoken.

Adam slammed his fist down on the back of the couch. “Stop ignoring me!” he barked.

Silence fell, thick and tense. Adam clenched and unclenched his jaw, dragging in long, heavy breaths, then let his hand fall loose, drooping lamely over the side of the couch. “I’m sorry that’s how you feel,” Koschei finally said.

Adam’s breath whistled as he let it out through his teeth. “It’s been a long day,” he excused himself.

“I completely understand,” said Koschei with emphasis.

Adam let out a _tch_. “Sure,” he sneered.

“There isn’t a single experience in the world that’s wholly, truly unique,” Koschei told him.

He pretended he didn't see his fist clenching under his jacket.

***

“I had a girlfriend once.”

 _Ran for the hills, did she?_ had fought a fierce battle with _Only once?_ “What happened?” Koschei asked.

Adam had kicked the coffee table. “She left,” he’d said bitterly. “And then she died.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Bet she was, too.” He’d kicked the coffee table again.

Which was, he thought later that night, something to think about.

It had taken him a second, maybe less, to glance through the obituary. Short and lovely and dripping with sentiment. How sweet.

The article had been a pleasant find.

He reached forwards and traced the glowing edges of the familiar face with his knuckle.

Fancy that.

Well.

There was always time for another side project.

***

“What does it mean, when you talk about how much a person’s worth?”

Koschei glanced up from his notebook, raising his eyebrow. Adam met his gaze unflinchingly, jaw squared. “What’s brought this on?” he finally asked.

Adam’s fingers flexed on the back of the couch. “Just thinking,” he said, shrugging in what might have been an offhand way had he not been rigid as a board.

Koschei closed his notebook and set it aside. “Well,” he said, “that depends. Everyone sees value in different ways. A quality that one person sees in the best light might mean nothing to someone else. Many people,” he added, giving his pen a quick twirl between his fingers before putting it down on top of the notebook, “like to say that you choose what you’re worth yourself. That you define your own value.” He bit down on his tongue the moment the words were out of his mouth, the tip of it pressing against the inside of his cheek.

Adam didn’t quite manage to hide his snort fast enough. “Oh, yeah?” His mouth twitched in an aborted sneer. “Okay, then. What if I decide I’m worth more than other people?”

This time, Koschei didn’t pretend to think. “There’s nothing stopping you from thinking that,” he said. Adam’s face twitched at the wording and Koschei nearly burst out laughing. _Predictable. Predictable and_ funny. “And,” he continued, “there’s nothing stopping other people from deciding that they’re worth more than you.”

“But they wouldn’t be,” said Adam, “because I’m the one who decides that, yeah?”

“You decide for yourself,” Koschei corrected. “And they do the same.”

Adam yanked his hands away from the couch like he’d been burnt and began pacing, dragging his hands through his hair. “Okay,” he said. “Okay. Okay.” He shoved one hand in a pocket and tugged on the hem of his shirt with his other one. “Okay,” he said again. “Here’s the thing, though—think about it this way. What you decide for yourself,” he said slowly, like he was spelling it out in his mind, emphasizing each word with a tug on his shirt, “doesn’t matter. Because nobody else knows, right?”

“Nothing can be acknowledged until it becomes fact,” Koschei agreed. “Which, unfortunately, isn’t something likely to happen regarding self-worth.”

“Right.” Adam nodded. “Right, exactly right. What about other people, though? Because that means that what I think about them is right, right?”

“Sure,” said Koschei.

“I’m more,” said Adam fiercely. “Right? That’s it, isn’t it?”

“If you say so.” Koschei fingers itched. He pressed his palms together in his lap, folding his palms neatly away from Adam’s gaze. “Though,” he said, crossing one leg over the other, “you’d have to find some way to prove it.”

Adam came to a screeching halt, hand balled into a fist on the back of the patient’s couch. “What if I decide I’m worth more than you?” he asked, the softest Koschei had ever heard his voice.

 _Well, now_. Koschei raised his eyebrows and cocked his head. “Well,” he said, “then I’d advise you not to say it out loud.”

***

It doesn’t take nearly as long as Koschei had expected, but still longer than he’d have liked.

The handle turned with a squeak like a whisper and the door creaked open. Koschei glanced at his watch then shut his notebook and slid it into a drawer.

No matter. Three months was better than nothing.

“You’re early,” he said.

Adam stood silhouetted in the doorway like a shadow, hands buried in his pockets up to his forearms. “I listened at the door,” he said. “Didn’t think there was anyone else here.”

“You were right.” Koschei stood up and tossed his jacket over the back of his chair. “Well? Come in.”

Adam didn’t move until Koschei had settled into his own seat, crossing one leg over the other and folding his hands in his lap. His feet dragged across the ground, leaving grooves in the carpet, and he more threw than sat himself into his seat.

“Is everything alright?” asked Koschei, knowing full well that they couldn’t have been more so.

Adam let out a snicker that sounded more like a wheeze. “Wouldn’t have come early if it were, would I?”

“No,” Koschei agreed. “What’s wrong, Adam?”

Adam flung one leg over the other, then switched, then switched again. “Dr. Oakdown, you—” he switched again. “You know me, right?” His foot jittered up and down. “I mean, I tell you things.”

“Yes. . .” Koschei’s gaze flicked to his hand, clenched in a fist and pressing into the couch next to him, then back to his face.

“Right,” said Adam. “And—” He dropped both feet back to the ground. “Is—” He wet his lips, bouncing his knees up and down. “That doctor-patient-confidentiality thing,” he said. “It’s still on, right?”

“It always has been,” said Koschei, pushing down his mounting frustration. _One thing, and you can’t even spit it out?_

“And that means that you can’t tell anyone anything, right?” Adam pressed. “Nothing I’ve done, or. . . or nothing you _think_ I’ve done, or—”

“Adam, if there’s anything you’re worried about—”

“No!” Adam lunged forwards. His knees banged against the edge of the coffee table and he leaned forwards until his rear was all but hanging off the edge of the couch. “This is _important_ ,” he pressed. “You can’t—can’t sell me out, or betray me, or— I can trust you, right?”

 _Not as far as you can throw me_. “Adam, please, just tell me—”

Adam let out a sharp, brittle laugh. “Of course you don’t understand,” he spat. He lurched to his feet and stumbled around the couch, dragging his hands down his face. Koschei clenched his jaw, letting a slow breath out through his nose. “I wouldn’t expect you to.” He shook his head, greasy strands of hair flopping over his forehead. “You haven’t got a _clue_ —”

“Out with it, Adam.”

“Walters died.”

 _Well_. Koschei stared at him. Adam flexed his fingers on the back of the couch, chest heaving like he’d just ran a marathon. “What?” he asked.

“Walters,” Adam repeated. “Is.” He looked up. “Dead.”

Koschei kept his expression carefully blank. “Your problem?”

Adam shook his head. His lips were white from chewing, and, when he spoke, his teeth were clenched. “Dealt with.”

Koschei nodded. “Sit down, Adam.”

Adam shook his head again. “Don’t think I will.”

“Adam, sit down.”

“It felt— God, it felt. . .” Adam shook his head again. The leather creaked where he dug his fingers into it. “It was like—”

“Sit down!”

Adam kicked the couch. “Don’t tell me what to do!” he yelled. “Because—because this is _my time_ , right? My session! So just sit there, and listen, and tell me that I’m—”

“Where’s the body?”

Adam’s nails dragged against the leather. “What?” he bit out.

“Body, Adam. Where is it?”

He shook his head in a way that looked more like a shudder, or electric jerk, and bared his teeth. “Not telling.”

“Why’s that?” Koschei leaned back in his seat, spreading his arms languidly.

“Have you even been listening to me?” Adam demanded. “Have you heard yourself? I _killed_ someone, doctor!” he shouted. “He’s dead!” He threw his arms into the air. “You’re in a room with a murderer, Dr. Oakdown,” he snarled. “Aren’t you scared?”

 _Aren’t you?_ Koschei tilted his head. “Should I be?”

“What do you think?”

“Well, I don’t know, do I?”

“Yeah,” Adam snarled.

“Why’s that?”

Adam surged forwards and around the couch. “‘Cause it hurt,” he hissed, leaning forwards, knees crashing onto the coffee table. “I _made_ it hurt. I wanted it to hurt.” Flecks of spit landed on Koschei’s face and in his beard. He wrinkled his nose and wiped them away. “He’s a red spot on the concrete, and everyone’s gonna know it, and I’m the one who did it.” His breath was putrid, reeking of acid and ham. Koschei could almost see it flooding into the air and seeping into every corner of the room.

Koschei wiped his hand on his waistcoat. “How did it feel?”

A vein pulsed on Adam’s brow. “What?”

“‘It felt,’” said Koschei. “What did it feel like?” Adam ground his teeth. “Let me try,” said Koschei. “Satisfaction, am I right?” Adam snorted. “No?”

“You wouldn’t get it,” Adam bit out.

“No?”

“How could you?” Adam scratched his scalp furiously. Dandruff rained down on his shoulders, and dust, and strands of hair, and flecks of dry, flaky brown. “It—”

“ _Quiet_ , Adam.”

He saw the fist coming before it was thrown, and vaulted out of his seat and to the side before Adam even had the chance to miss his mark. Adam yelped and jerked his hand back towards himself, cradling it to his chest, nursing the bruise that was beginning to form on his thumb; the couch’s frame was _killer_.

Even more was the swift kick aimed at his shin.

Adam collapsed with a howl and Koschei scampered out of reach of his flailing arms. “Shut,” he snarled, grabbing him by the sleeves and yanking him to his feet, “the _fuck_ up.”

It was a combination of Koschei throwing him and Adam’s wriggling that landed him back on the couch. He jerked, as if moving to stand up again, but quickly reconsidered and flopped back, chest heaving. “You hit me,” he finally said, the beginnings of shock blooming on his face.

Koschei ignored him. “I’d like you to stay there, if you don’t mind,” he said, moving around him. If Adam heard the lock click, he didn’t give any indication of it. “I’d hate to have to add property damage to your bill.”

Adam didn’t move. Koschei leaned against the door and, at long last, let the smile break across his face. “Where’s the body?” he asked again.

Adam told him.

***

“You’ve outdone yourself this time,” said Koschei before Adam had even closed the door.

The lock snapped into place. “What?”

Koschei spun his pen in one hand, the other one propping up his chin. “A library, Adam?” Adam scoffed and leaned against the door, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Could have eased up a bit on the symbolism, but it works, I suppose.”

Adam snorted. “You gonna tell me how you know about that?”

Koschei twirled his pen then caught it in his fist. “Hm.”

Adam sneered. “Oh, yeah?” The tip of his foot crept in front of the door. “Well—”

“No threats, Adam, please.” Koschei gestured at the empty couch.

Adam ignored him, dragging his heels across the carpet as he ambled across the room. “What did you think?” he asked, picking at the edge of a frame.

Koschei scowled. “Inspired.” Adam, his back turned, huffed and tapped his finger against a peak of dry paint. “Impossibly so.”

Adam smacked his palm against the painting. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just an observation.”

“The Master.” Adam scowled. “Infamous,” he muttered, tracing the tail of the serpent with the tip of his finger. “I don’t think he’d complain.”

“Bosom buddies, are you?” Koschei’s hands were itching. He flexed his fingers, curling and unfurling them, and curling them again.

Adam let out a sharp bark of a laugh. “Don’t need to be.”

“No?”

“Doesn’t matter, does it?” Adam shrugged easily. “I’d be pleased, if I were him,” he said. “Mimicry’s the highest form of compliment, right?”

“That’s what they say.” The page crinkled beneath Koschei’s fingers and he flipped it as Adam looked sharply over his shoulder. “Mimicry gets old, though. As they say,” he continued, “the shadow never catches up with the sun.”

Adam stared at him for a moment. “I’m not,” he finally said, turning around again. Koschei rolled his eyes. “We decide our worth, right?” he asked, leaning forwards and bumping his forehead against the painting.

Koschei’s scowl, if possible, grew darker. “You think you’re worth more than them.”

“Know,” Adam corrected, crouching to pick at the skirting board. “And that’s not what I mean. Let me finish, would you?” He must have assumed Koschei had nodded, because he carried on without skipping a beat. “Here’s the question,” he said. “Thing, actually,” he corrected. “Teachers and students, and all that.” He paused, glancing expectantly over his shoulder.

Koschei flicked his pen with his thumb and it spun around his finger, letting it whip through the air like a dancer on a string. “Is that what you see yourself as?” he asked. “A student, an apprentice?”

Adam grinned toothily. “If you like.”

 _Not in the slightest_. Koschei clenched the tip of his pen in his fist. “Most,” he say, “would say something further along the lines of ‘inferior copy.’”

Adam’s smile, half fake to begin with, twisted into a scowl. “Most,” he said, standing up, “would be wrong. _Godfather 2_?” Koschei barely held back a sharp bark of laughter. Adam seemed to notice, because his scowl deepened. “More,” he snapped.

“Pardon?”

“ _More_ ,” Adam repeated. “I’m. _More_. More than him—” he backed up, turning—twirling, even—to face Koschei, “—more than them, those _morons_ hunting me—” Koschei’s jaw jerked imperceptibly, “—and more than. . .” He trailed off. The implication couldn’t have been clearer than if he’d painted it on a wall, or stood on the roof banging pots and pans and shouting it out to the world.

Seriously, it really couldn't have been.

Koschei’s teeth dug into the inside of his lip. “That so?”

“Well.” He grinned, and Koschei fantasized about pulling out each tooth individually and stringing them across his ribcage. “We decide, right?”

The mocking tone was probably his imagination. Probably.

For a moment, the clip of his pen dug painfully into his palm. “How do you sleep, Adam?” he asked suddenly, flipping open a new pad. He left a blue smudge across the paper when his hand brushed it and he paused to give himself a moment to screw the head firmly back on.

“Are you talking about morality?” asked Adam. “Because it doesn’t matter.”

“I’m asking about your sleep,” said Koschei, scribbling his signature across the dotted line. “Are you having trouble falling asleep?”

“Why do you care?” Adam’s scowl deeped as he leaned over, trying to get a peek. “What is that?” he demanded.

Koschei tore the page free. “A prescription for flunitrazepam,” he said, holding it out. “I think you’ll find it useful.”

Adam didn’t move, glower fixed firmly on his face. He’d end up stuck like that, if he wasn’t careful. Well, he could only improve. “What’s that, an anti-psychosis?” He sneered. “Sedative?” His voice dipped into a mocking drawl. “Sleeping pill?”

Koschei inclined his head. “Why would I give you that?” he asked. “It’s just a benzodiazepine, Adam.”

Adam’s scowl deepened. “Oh, yeah?”

“Oh, yeah,” Koschei agreed. “Your friend,” he said, “seemed to find it helpful.”

Adam jammed his hands into his pockets, legs jiggling wildly. Koschei didn’t move, letting the paper dangle between them like a limp flag of ceasefire.

Adam rocketed to his feet and snatched the sheet, balling it up in his fist and shoving it into his pocket. Koschei leaned over the armrest of his seat and smiled demurely after him. “Sweet dreams,” he called.

The door slammed shut with a bang. The smile dropped off Koschei’s face like a pebble from a cliff and he sank lower into his seat, face twisting into a grimace of fury.

He pressed his thumb against the hair-thin papercut on his finger and let out a small hiss.

***

One week. One week of blessed silence.

“Doctor.”

Koschei didn’t look up from his laptop. “The door was locked.”

“I know.”

Koschei saw, out of the corner of his eye, Adam looming by the door. He rolled his eyes. “Intimidation only works when there’s something worth being afraid of, you know.”

“Shut up.”

“Well, that’s hardly polite, is it?”

“Just returning the favour,” spat Adam. “‘Shut the _fuck_ up,’ I think, were your exact words.”

“Were they?” asked Koschei drily, shutting his laptop. “I can’t seem to recall.”

Adam stomped forwards and slammed his hands down on Koschei’s desk. Not quite hard enough to make it rattle, but enough to make the water in his glass quiver. Koschei gave Adam an admonishing look and he scowled. “Don’t,” he snarled, breath hot on Koschei’s face, “piss me off, _Doctor_.”

Calmly, Koschei reached up and took off his glasses. A vein throbbed in Adam’s forehead as he watched him wipe the foggy lenses on the corner of his jacket. “Well?” he barked. Spittle flew into Koschei’s face and he looked up, mock surprise writ across his face.

“Oh, was that a threat?” he inquired politely.

Adam’s breath was rattling hard enough he almost looked to be hyperventilating. “I can kill you,” he told Koschei. “Really, I can.”

“Then,” said Koschei, “it would only be fair of me to warn you. After all—” he stood, walking around Adam, hitting him hard with his shoulder, “—I would be obliged to report it.” His voice softened in a way only a fool would mistake for kindness. “Confidentiality doesn’t cover the future, Adam.”

Luckily, Adam Mitchell was just mad enough, or gone enough, or just plain stupid enough to be that fool. He whirled around, fists clenched. “What about now?” he demanded as Koschei unzipped his bag. Koschei fancied he could almost hear the bones in his hands creaking as his fists tightened. “No one to stop me,” he hissed, stepping forwards. Koschei ignored him, instead sliding his journals into his bag and slipping his phone into the back pocket. “Pretty accident for a famous loner,” he growled and Koschei nearly bust a lung holding back his laughter. “I Googled you,” he snarled with all the menace of a toddler’s tantrum.

“You’re very confident,” noted Koschei, slipping his jacket off the back of his seat and buttoning it over his waistcoat.

“So are you.” The carpet creaked behind him. He didn’t look up, calmly zipping up his bag and turning around. “Where’d you learn to fight?” Adam asked as Koschei strode across the room.

“Boarding school was a nightmare,” Koschei answered easily, taking his overcoat from the rack and slinging it over his shoulders. The wool was heavy, and his jaw jerked when he felt the wrinkles pressing into his back. He straightened it. “My office closed an hour ago, Mr. Mitchell.” He twisted the knob and held the door open with his foot.

Adam didn’t move. “You cancelled my appointment.”

“So I did.”

“Again.”

“Yes.”

“Scared?” Adam challenged.

Koschei cocked his head. “Of what?”

“An email.” Adam sounded almost disgusted as he stepped forwards. “An _automated_ email.”

Koschei glanced down at his watch. “Which does,” he said, “incidentally, make you a trespasser.”

“There was a blonde here,” Adam accused. “That—”

“Good _night_ , Mr. Mitchell.”

“Are you working with them?” Adam demanded. “You’ve told them everything, haven’t you? You’ve told your little _friend_ —” Koschei’s lip curled, “—and now you want to get rid of me, before—”

Koschei didn’t bother hiding his yawn. “Mr. Mitchell, you are not currently here on appointment. Everything you told me before was in confidence, but there is nothing to be said about right now—”

“I could kill you,” Adam repeated. It was almost a mantra. It would have been amusing, had it not been so annoying.

He wasn’t even worth her bullet.

“Mr. Mitchell,” said Koschei calmly, looking up at him. He wasn't taller than him by much, but it was still noticeable—more so when he stalked forwards like this, back hunched and fists clenched like a B-list horror villain, teeth clenched almost comically. It bothered Koschei about as much as a wolf would the teeth of a mouse. “You’re not the only one who can make choices.”

It was as good a conclusion as any.


	16. Chapter Twelve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Comical too was just how well he matched the picture she’d painted of the copycat in her mind, down to the wild-eyed, self-induced mania and quivering jowls, and the foaming at the mouth bellied by pimples and baby fat. She would’ve given herself a pat on the back, had she not felt so much like hitting something.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what it may lack in length it makes up for with funky emojis

Arrests never felt good.

Sure, they felt good, but they never felt  _ good _ . Theta wasn’t sure what it was; dissonance, was that the word? Something unsettling. The barest hint of solidarity with the man in chains, maybe, or the very fact that it was something that had to be done at all.

( _ What do we do now? _ Rose had asked.

_ Wait _ , she should have said.

She hadn’t.)

She lingered in the background as Jack knocked on the door, mouthed along with the lines she’d fed him earlier, and watched as they led him away, red-faced and spluttering and so enraged it was almost comical.

Comical too was just how well he matched the picture she’d painted of the copycat in her mind, down to the wild-eyed, self-induced mania and quivering jowls, and the foaming at the mouth bellied by pimples and baby fat. She would’ve given herself a pat on the back, had she not felt so much like hitting something.

(“How do you know?” Jack had asked. He never used to ask that before. Not that she could blame him.

Her gaze had flicked to the cane leaning against his desk. “He knew them,” she’d said. “All of them.”

He’d frowned. “No one ever mentioned him,” he’d said.

“Because it wasn’t personal,” she’d replied. “Well, it was. Not like that, though.”

“That makes so much sense. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

She’d flexed her fingers in her pocket. “We were wrong,” she’d said.

“How?”

She’d shrugged. “It’s hard,” she’d said, “sometimes, to tell the difference between hate and love.”)

Martha’s cheeks were pink, despite the scarf wrapped up to her chin, and her hair trembled in the wind. “Adam Mitchell,” she said as Theta joined her.

“Adam Mitchell.” Theta kicked aside a small mound of snow. She hadn’t worn gloves, and was beginning to regret the decision; her fingers were aching again. Martha gave her a knowing look and handed over her cup of tea. Theta muttered a small thanks, shivering as she wrapped her fingers around the paper cup. It wasn’t quite as warm as it probably had been when Martha had driven over, nearly upsetting a mailbox on the way, but it was still a furnace to the icy chill of her skin.

Martha stamped her feet and pulled her coat a bit tighter around herself. “He’s good,” she admitted grudgingly.

Theta shook her head. “I don’t think he really knew what he was doing, at the end,” she said.  _ I don’t think he knew what he was doing at all _ .

“No,” Martha agreed, grinding her heel against the ground. Theta said nothing, and traced patterns on the lid of the cup.

Adam Mitchell was still shouting, even as Jack more manhandled than led him to the car parked at the curb. No denials, though, she noted. She wasn’t sure whether or not to be relieved.

“He’s not the Master,” said Martha. A fact, not a question.

“Nope.” Theta pinched the plastic of the lid. It bent and turned white beneath her nails.

“Do you think he knew him?” she asked.

_ Yes _ . “Nah.” She pried the lid off the rim of the cup and tucked it into her pocket. Steam billowed out, and she imagined the microscopic droplets freezing on her face and in the air. “Probably not. Almost definitely not.” She swirled the cup around and watched the tea splash against the sides. “Just a copycat.” The words felt sour on her tongue.

“Not  _ just _ anything, anymore,” said Martha bitterly.

Theta ran her tongue over her chapped lips. “No,” she agreed. “He’s not.” In the back of the car, the subject of their conversation yelled a very nasty insult, and Jack made a rude gesture at him before slamming the door shut. Adam Mitchell only just managed to yank his leg in before it was crushed.

“Think they’ll call him the Apprentice?” Martha asked drily.

Theta took a sip of the tea. It had gone cold. “What do you want me to say?”

Martha shook her head. “Nothing.”

“‘Sorry?’” Theta pressed. “‘I’ll do better?’ What, Martha?”

“ _ Nothing _ , alright?” Martha snapped. “I know you’re disappointed, but you don’t have to bite my head off!”

Theta’s fingers dug into the sides of the cup. “Sorry,” she muttered. The guilt pooling in the pit of her stomach was starting to feel more like a vat of acid. She took another gulp of cold tea. It didn’t help.

Martha shook her head again. “Adam Mitchell,” she said. She hesitated. “He. . .” She wet her lips. “That girl, Annie Hopkins—”

(“Not him,” she would say.  
“No,” she could agree.

“Who, then?” she would ask. “And why?”)

(Words didn’t mean anything. Not really.)

Theta snapped the lid back onto the cup. “Yeah.”

Martha nodded. “Jake’s back in town today,” she said. And then, almost hesitantly, “We’re meeting him and Mickey at the pub later. Do you—”

Theta handed the cup back. It was crushed and misshapen, the lid hanging off half-off, and tea the colour of wet mold was dripping from a hole in the paper. “Sorry,” she said. She wasn’t sure what she was apologizing for. “I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah?”

She was used to grim victories. This was hollow.

The bodies on the slabs have never felt further away.

***

**ew 🤢❤️, 6:18**

Meeting in ten ish. Ride?

(ppwork in email just give signature)

**ew 🤢❤️, 6:23**

?

U ok?

**ew 🤢❤️, 6:37**

Theta where are you

**ew 🤢❤️, 6:49**

???

**ew 🤢❤️, 7:23**

Meeting done

**ew 🤢❤️, 8:32**

Dude what the fuck

**ew 🤢❤️, 9:51**

theta

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this entire fic is dedicated to that one time will graham butchered a furry and everyone just kinda forgot about it and also thirteen lowkey murdering people while the fam cheers her on in the background amen

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna be real with you lads, this is _not_ what I thought this fic was going to be.
> 
> no one:  
> me, fresh from finishing hannibal: hey what if this but spydoc and weirder
> 
> [my tumblr](https://doritoface1q.tumblr.com/)   
>  [masterversary tumblr](https://dwmasters.tumblr.com/)
> 
> beta'd by [allthingswhovian](https://allthingswhovian.tumblr.com/) on tumblr!


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